Biodiesel is current king at Port of Rotterdam

Biofuels throughput at the Port of Rotterdam rose by 24% in 2012 when compared to the year before.

The final total last year hit 5.9 million and the port attributes that rise mainly to biodiesel as its import and export volumes both increased by 1.5 million tonnes.

To contrast that figure, the throughput of ethanol dropped by 17% to 1.4 million tonnes and ETBE fell 8% to 600,000 tonnes.

In a statement the port claims 900,000 tonnes of the total biodiesel came from Asia, while Argentina also contributed significantly. The main final destinations for the biodiesel were Spain, the UK and Germany.

The drop in ethanol levels is placed at the tailing off of E90 imports from the US after the import tariff was adjusted.