Leading article: A welcome proposal - but no magic bullet

At last, some refreshing signs of intelligent thinking on climate change are coming out of Whitehall. The Environment minister, Elliot Morley, reveals today in an interview with this newspaper that the Government is drawing up plans to impose a "biofuel obligation" on oil companies. This would require major firms such as BP and Shell to blend a fixed proportion of biofuels with the petrol and diesel they sell on Britain's garage forecourts. This has the potential to be the biggest green innovation in the British petrol market since the introduction of unleaded petrol a decade and a half ago.

The beauty of biofuels - petrol made from sugar beet and diesel made from oilseed rape - is that they are "carbon neutral". The quantity of C0₂ they produce when burnt has already been absorbed by the crops used to make them. There is no reason why a biofuel quota should not work. Requiring oil companies to use a proportion of environmentally-friendly fuels in their pumps is no different from the present requirement on electricity companies to use a proportion of their energy from renewable sources such as wind power.

Related articles

• Revolution at the pumps as Government backs biofuels
• Elliot Morley: 'To deliver the 20pc target every government department has got to make its contribution'
• Search the news archive for more stories

This is encouraging. Biofuels are something the Government can introduce without running into massive resistance from vested-interest groups. BP and Shell have already indicated that they would be amenable. A requirement of 5 per cent biofuel in each litre sold would mean Britain would produce a million tonnes of emissions less a year. This requirement could be gradually increased over time.

Biofuel production has the potential to expand, not just in Britain but around the world. Brazil has been producing ethanol from sugar cane for some time and is building a specialised motor industry to run on the green fuel. There is no reason why the UK should not develop its own biofuel industry in time. Some companies are waiting in the wings to increase capacity. In the US, the output of ethanol from maize is rising at 30 per cent a year. And China has finished construction of the world's largest ethanol plant. The Government may find it is pushing at an open door.

Yet it is important that biofuels are not regarded as a panacea. Their introduction must be part of a wider package of measures to tackle global warming alongside heavy investment in renewable energies, taxation of air traffic and - most important - statutory curbs on emissions. Otherwise the risk is increased biofuel use will become simply a gesture. Pains must also be taken to ensure biofuel production is environmentally-friendly, too. Clearing woodland to plant sugar beet or oilseed rape would be counterproductive. Ideally, the Government would devise a way of encouraging Britain's farmers to make more crops for biofuel instead of growing crops that could be produced more cheaply in the developing world. This model has the potential to work in the whole of Europe - and could point to a way out of the impasse over reform of the Common Agricultural Policy.

Britain is still on track to reach its Kyoto target of cutting emissions by 12.5 per cent from 1990 levels by the end of the decade. This is largely due to the replacement of coal-fired power stations with gas-fired units that took place in the mid-1990s. But UK emissions have been rising in recent years as road traffic has increased and high oil prices have made coal energy more desirable once again. And the Government is struggling to meet its more ambitious commitment to cut C0₂ emissions by 20 per cent by 2010.

The Government's interest in promoting biofuels is welcome, but we must remember there is no magic bullet for the climate change problem. This is one step forward on a long, difficult road.