Conservation agriculture to promote inland biofuel production in Italy: An economic assessment of rapeseed straight vegetable oil as a self-supply agricultural biofuel

In order to reach the national target in the use of renewable energy in the transport sector, about 55% of the biodiesel consumed in Italy is imported. However, imported biofuel is currently debated since large-scale production has entailed different environmental and socioeconomic problems. Sustainability in biofuel production is a priority for the European Union and with the new Common Agricultural Policy 2014–2020 (CAP) this priority could become an opportunity through access to aids for the adoption of sustainable agricultural practices. Considering the importance to promote small-scale biofuel production, this study aimed to assess the economic feasibility of rapeseed straight vegetable oil (SVO) use as a self-supply agricultural biofuel in Italian context, assuming that rapeseed is cultivated by using practices of conservation agriculture. The financial support of the new CAP was considered, and alternative hypotheses were assumed to promote the SVO supply chains. The economic analysis shows that EU aids can help to promote inland biofuel production, ensuring positive profits for farmers (with a net present value up to 181 thousand €), thereby reducing the risk connected to investments, mainly due to the fluctuation of some key variables, like diesel price. Moreover, results highlight the importance of establishing farmers’ associations: given the high cost of the initial investment, the absence of an agreement for the creation of an optimum-sized supply chains might make those investments non profitable. Agricultural policy is therefore helpful to promote sustainable biofuel production, making the supply chains independent and self-sufficient over time. In this context, to ensure a sustainable biofuel production, beside the provision of support to the initial investments, it is also important to consider in the future biofuel policy scenario the possibility to incentive energy crop cultivation by promoting conservation agricultural practices (e.g., crop diversification, crop rotation, minimum tillage).