cies to promote gasohol, which is a blend of 10% ethyl al­cohol and 90% gasoline. The Thai gasohol program started in 1985. As of December 2005 the country had more than 4,000 stations serving alternative fuels and an import ban on methyl tertiary-butyl ether (MTBE), which is the petrol-based fuel additive that ethanol replaces, will be mandated in 2007. The government has pledged a renewable energy target of 8% of total energy consumption with 24% of the target as liquid biofuel. Initiatives are also under way in the Philippines and Indonesia to implement similar gasohol policies (Bhandhubanyong, 2005; Yuit and Wall, 2006). In addition, the promotion of biodiesel produced from coconut oil is under way in the Philippines, with Thailand, Malay­sia and Singapore expected to follow suit. The Indonesian government is focusing on biodiesel production from palm oil. An anticipated 5.6 billion of the 22 billion USD pledged for biofuel production and distribution initiatives will be spent on palm oil production. Similarly, the Malaysian biod­iesel policy is expected to produce up to 500,000 tonnes of a biodiesel blend of 5% palm-oil-derived and 95% petro­leum-derived diesel (Yuit and Wall, 2006). These are techni­cal potential estimates and the utilization of full technical potential is dependent on economic viability.

4.2.9.3   Bioelectricity or electricity from biomass
Given growing global energy demands, a question of interest relates to the potential for biomass to produce electricity. A sustainable, economically competitive global bioenergy sup­ply is around 270 EJ per year, which is approximately 70% of the total world energy consumption in 1990 (Coombs et al., 1992).
     Rice husks in Southeast Asia have significant potential for electricity generation. It was estimated that 28.5 million tonnes of rice husk are produced in Southeast Asia per year. Assuming energy content of 3,000 kcal per kg of rice husk and accounting for typical boiler and steam turbine efficien­cies, a steam turbine consuming 5.4 kg kW-1 will potentially produce 2778 MWe or 24.35 x 106 MWh (at 100% load factor). Since the total average energy consumption per hour for the Southeast Asian countries is 16,628 MWe, rice husk could theoretically supply 13.6% of the total electricity con­sumption. However, this figure depends on capacity of husk­ing mills and associated costs (Himpe, 1997).
     A recent study analyzed the global bioenergy potential for the period 2050-2100 based on forecasted future devel­opment paths and land-use patterns using four storylines of the IPCC SRES Emission Scenarios. The resulting potential for abandoned land ranges from about 130 to 410 EJ yr-1 in 2050 up to 240 to 850 EJ yr-1 in 2100. While the potential at low-productive land is negligible, "at rest" land could potentially provide approximately 35 to 245 EJ yr-1 in 2050 and from about 35 to 265 EJ yr-1 in 2100. At a regional level, South Asia has an average of approximately 3% of world potential for abandoned agricultural land and 5 % of world potential for "at rest" land for the year 2050 (Hoog-wijk, 2004). A contrasting study of bioenergy potential in the USA concluded that 709 million ha would be needed to meet the country's gasoline demands for a business-as-usual scenario in 2050. This figure decreases to 46 million ha through improvement of biofuel conversion efficiency and increases in feedstock yield (Greene, 2004).

4.2.9.4   Competing land uses and implications for food security
While the intent of biofuels projects would be to make use of existing agricultural land or abandoned and/or low qual­ity farmlands, the clearing of virgin forest as well as agri­culture and forest lands may be necessary to meet projected energy demands if biofuels are to be relied upon to the ex­tent projected in some of the estimates reported above. As a result, any emission reductions provided by the use of bio­fuels will be lessened due to the significant loss of carbon sequestration capacity when virgin forest is cut down (Yuit and Wall, 2006).
     Furthermore, while forests themselves provide a source of biomass (in the form of timber harvest waste, unmarket­able lumber, trees removed during land clearing operations, wood residues produced by sawmills, forest thinning mate­rial, and leaves and other forest litter), overexploitation of this resource will result in damage to forest ecosystems and a subsequent loss in biodiversity. This is a concern especially for biodiversity rich continents such as Asia (Bird Life Inter­national, 2005; Kampman et al., 2005). Unless alternative sources of energy are developed, forest policy must incorpo­rate energy needs into afforestation and forest preservation strategies in order to meet projected demands for biofuel.
     Energy security is also linked with food production since a predominant use of traditional biofuels is cooking. Therefore, the adequate supply of traditional biofuels has an important bearing on nutritional security, especially in rural areas and low income households (Mahapatra and Mitchell, 1999; Kampman et al., 2005).
     A study in eastern India investigated the increased pres­sure on regional forests to provide fuelwood, which is the major traditional biofuel in rural eastern India. Dwindling supplies are influencing the use of crop residues, leaf litter, dung, and kerosene to meet energy needs. The mean per per­son consumption of fuelwood, dung, leaf fuel and crop resi­dues by farm households is 0.46, 0.08, 0.12 and 0.04 tonnes respectively. Other reasons for using dung include higher livestock numbers, insufficient labor to gather fuelwood, and accessibility of biogas plants. Leaf fuel is gaining recognition since it is essentially free from the legal, social and political constraints associated with forest biomass. However, inten­sive use of dung, agricultural wastes and leaf litter may de­prive the soils of much needed organic nutrients. The study also evaluated the hypothesis that dwindling forest biomass supplies will motivate tree planting. The analyses concluded that on-farm production of fuelwood was not influenced by scarcity of forests. However, agroforestry has the potential to limit deforestation and improve agricultural productiv­ity by freeing up labor hours normally dedicated to fuel-wood collection (Mahapatra and Mitchell, 1999). Thus, the promotion of tree planting on-farm and provision of com­munity land to meet fuelwood demand should be deliber­ated (FAO, 1998, 1999; Slingerland and van Geuns, 2005). However, the influence of community agroforestry on con­servation depends on secure land tenure and associated land ownership rights (Contreras-Hermosilla and Fay, 2005).
     Competing uses of land for biofuel feedstock produc­tion could have impacts on food security. A major con­straint of the biofuel industry is land availability and the competition between biofuel feedstock and food crops for