In their largely discussed work, Fargione et al. (2008) and Searchinger et al. (2008) showed the importance of including land-use change emissions in the GHG balance of biofuels. Righelato and Spracklen (2007) have even questioned biofuels production as a strategy to mit­igate global warming. Direct land-use change concerns for example the case where produc­tion of energy crops for biofuels production leads to the conversion of land actually storing carbon (e. g., grassland, native ecosystems) to cultivated land for biofuels production. Missing to consider the previous storage of carbon will overestimate the reduction of GHG emissions of the biofuel chain. On the contrary, when the feedstock is produced on degraded soil, it can contribute to improve the soil carbon balance (Panichelli and Gnansounou, 2008). Conse­quently, the choice of the previous state of the land-use system can significantly affect the GHG balance of the biofuel. Direct land-use change is taken into account in a few recent stud­ies (e. g., ADEME, 2010; CONCAWE-EUCAR-JRC, 2008; EMPA, 2007a). In the three studies, the recommendations of IPCC (2003a) are used for this purpose.

Taking into consideration indirect land-use change (land-use changes due to displaced activities or biomass use) is more complex as the indirect conversion of land is a global and dynamic issue that is difficult to relate accurately to biofuels production, more research works are needed for improving the methodologies on this aspect.