NEN – Draft NTA 8080 available for comments

Recently, a working group consisting of representatives from biomass producers and users, NGOs, research institutes, government and certification bodies has been working on the revision of NTA 8080, the standard describing sustainability criteria for biomass. Changes include that the scope now covers both bioenergy and biobased products and that the standard will be published in two parts: part 1 containing the sustainability requirements and part 2 containing the chain-of-custody requirements. The draft standards of both parts are now available for comments. Comments can be submitted till January 5, 2015.

The first edition of NTA 8080 was published in 2009. A certification system has been developed based on this standard using the same name. This certification system has been recognized by the European Commission to demonstrate compliance with the sustainability criteria as laid down in the Renewable Energy Directive (RED). New insights into sustainability have been gained over the past five years. Also several certification projects resulted in useful information to update NTA 8080.

New sustainability aspects include cascading of biomass and the option to produce ‘ILUC low risk’ biomass. In addition, requirements have been reformulated based on practical experiences, references to the European sustainability standards (EN 16214 series ‘Sustainability criteria for the production of biofuels and bioliquids for energy applications – Principles, criteria, indicators and verifiers’) have been incorporated, and elements of the international sustainability standard – currently under development (future ISO 13065, ‘Sustainability criteria for bioenergy’) – have been considered.

Broadly applicable and widely supported

The working group ‘NTA 8080 revision’ is committed to a broadly applicable and widely supported agreement. This commenting phase aims, among other things, at receiving feedback on the draft standards from different angles, both nationally and internationally.

Interested persons and parties can download the draft standards from www.nen.nl/nta8080-for-comments. After closure of the commenting phase on January 5, 2015, the working group will discuss all submitted comments. Persons that have submitted comments will receive a response on the way their comments have been incorporated in the final version of NTA 8080.

Source

NEN, press release, 2014-11-24.

Supplier

European Commission
Netherlands Standardization Institute (NEN)

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