GCMD Sees Evidence of Widespread Biofuel Mislabelling

by Ship & Bunker News Team
Thursday May 22, 2025

The Global Centre for Maritime Decarbonisation (GCMD) has seen potential evidence of widespread mislabelling of biofuels that are used in marine blends.

The organisation has been investigating the biofuel market using the 'FAME fingerprinting' technique that it developed with testing firm VPS, it said in a LinkedIn post on Thursday.

The technique chemically verifies biodiesel feedstock by analysing its FAME profile. This can be used to determine whether suppliers are selling product mislabelled as having a difference feedstock source to that advertised.

"To detect such cases, GCMD collected and examined 16 FAME samples from different market suppliers," the organisation said in the post.

"We then compared the identities of these samples—based on their FAME fingerprints—against the suppliers' declared feedstock origins.

"Approximately one-third of the samples showed discrepancies between their FAME fingerprint and their labels, suggesting that mislabelling may indeed be as pervasive as reported."

The proper labelling of biofuels will be key to the implementation of the IMO 2028 deal setting carbon intensity targets for shipping.

If higher-GHG biofuels are mislabelled as having lower GHG emissions, large sections of the shipping industry may move into using these products to comply with IMO thresholds without having achieved the level of decarbonisation that their documentation would suggest.

Ship & Bunker News Team
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