Biodiesel Brazil L.L.C. is working in
partnership with different potential producers in funding projects to develop
an economic way for sugar and ethanol mills and the main supplier of
co-generation plants, sugar refineries and ethanol distilleries.
With the current rise in petrol prices,
and in light of the threat of global warming, the use of crops for the
production of bioethanol recently has attracted increasing attention.
Historically the most experienced, Brazil also is one of the leading countries
producing ethanol from the saccharose of sugar cane.
Brazil has the world's most advanced
biofuels market, with 30 years of experience in national ethanol production.
The state-of-the-art ethanol mills can
produce the biofuel
from cane sucrose at or below €13/US$18 cents a liter
(US$0.68/gallon),
experts say. This makes the fuel competitive when oil is at around US$35-40 per barrel.
Brazil learned how to produce and use
ethanol in the early 20th century, during World War I. Ethanol began to be
produced in a more planned and systematic manner in large scale in the 1970’s, with the creation of the
PROALCOOL, the National Alcohol Program, when this renewable fuel became
extremely important to the sustained development of the sugarcane
agro-industrial sector.
In February 2007, the federal government
announced plans to fuel Brazilian biotechnology by investing 3.5 billion EUR in this area over the next decade. The
budget will be used to fund biotechnological research, including the
development of a new strain of sugar cane that is resistant to drought. By
developing canes with this characteristic, Brazil may be able to expand crops
into areas which are substantially drier than the south-central region, where
currently almost 90 percent of Brazil’s sugar and ethanol are produced.
It is in this refreshed scenario that
Brazil assumes a privileged position —with the experience gained over decades
of regular use of biomass as a primary energy source— to argue about the
sustainability of the energy model currently in place, which is underpinned by
liquid fossil fuels. The production costs for Brazil's sugar-cane ethanol are
considerably lower, about $0.68 per gallon. This reflects the positive effects
of Brazil's climate for growing sugar cane as well as its lower labor costs.
The production yield for sugar cane is also higher than for corn-based
ethanol. Brazil uses ethanol to a significant degree to fuel its domestic
vehicle fleet. But perspective is important — U.S. gasoline demand is more
than 20 times that of Brazil. So while ethanol production levels are similar
in both countries, Brazil's output meets ~40% of its gasoline demand, while
U.S. ethanol production now satisfies only about 2% of its gasoline demand.
Countries which purport to be
socially-minded, energy-aware, politically -sensitive and globally-conscious
will need to join forces with investors to participate in the production of
alternative energy such as ethanol on an industrial scale, a development that
could revolutionize the industry by boosting the competitiveness and energy
balance of biofuels worldwide.
View Video
The
Sugar Mills are located near the sugar cane fields. It is here that the raw
sugar is separated from the plant and shipped to a refinery.
Some refineries, such as this one, create small cities around them as families grow working in the fields and in the mills and refineries.
Brazil Sugar-Cane
Ethanol
