THE Department of Energy (DOE) expects to draw back the interest of ethanol manufacturers with the recent release of a circular that prioritizes local production over imports.
On the sidelines of the First Philippine International BioEnergy Conference on Thursday, Jay
Layug, DOE undersecretary, said that the department is optimistic that investors will take a look back at the nascent ethanol industry now that oil companies are required to buy local supply.
For its part, the Department of Agriculture (DA) said also on Thursday said that it will open up 100,000 hectares of new areas for crops devoted to ethanol production.
“With the DOE circular, we expect them to come back,” Layug said. Under department circular DC2011-12-0013 released on December, oil companies were ordered to exhaust all local supply of ethanol for their blending requirements before importing abroad.
The circular stemmed from calls for government support from local ethanol manufacturers, who had struggled against cheap imports despite the passage of the Biofuels Act of 2006.
The said mandate called for a minimum blend of 10 percent locally-sourced ethanol blended with gasoline products, starting last year.
Among those that previously expressed interest in putting up ethanol plants prior to the DOE circular were JG Summit Corp., San Miguel Corp., First Pampanga Biofuels, Eastern Petroleum Corp. and Fuel Using Ethanol Ltd., among others.
Rose Marie Gumera, Sugar Regulatory Administration planning department manager, said that demand for ethanol this year is projected to grow to 500 million liters from 461 million liters in 2011.
However, the combined capacity of the country’s three existing plants, namely San Carlos Bioenergy, Inc., Leyte Agri Corp. and Roxol Bioenergy Corp., is only 79 million liters excluding the 54-million liter capacity of the ethanol facility that will be put up by Green Futures Innovations in March.
As such, Gumera said that the country would need 13 to 14 additional ethanol plants with a capacity of 30 million liters to fill demand.
“[The ethanol plants would require investments of] $2 billion each, including land development,” she added. Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala said that the new areas for ethanol crops will help the meet the requirement for bioethanol production and avoid conflict with existing areas dedicated to food production.
“The government is encouraging the wider use of renewable energy and the DA is deeply involved in finding areas for the massive cultivation of feedstock like sugar and sweet sorghum,” Alcala said also during the First Philippine International BioEnergy Conference.
He said that the government—through the National Convergence Initiative of the DA, Department of Agrarian Reform and the Department of Environment and Natural Resources—is finding land appropriate for the mass cultivation of sweet sorghum, sugarcane and other sources of bioethanol feedstock.
Experts have said that for sugarcane to be a major feedstock for ethanol, the best option is to use genetically-modified sugarcane like the Honeywell strain developed by the University of Queensland in Australia.
On the sidelines of the First Philippine International BioEnergy Conference on Thursday, Jay
Layug, DOE undersecretary, said that the department is optimistic that investors will take a look back at the nascent ethanol industry now that oil companies are required to buy local supply.
For its part, the Department of Agriculture (DA) said also on Thursday said that it will open up 100,000 hectares of new areas for crops devoted to ethanol production.
“With the DOE circular, we expect them to come back,” Layug said. Under department circular DC2011-12-0013 released on December, oil companies were ordered to exhaust all local supply of ethanol for their blending requirements before importing abroad.
The circular stemmed from calls for government support from local ethanol manufacturers, who had struggled against cheap imports despite the passage of the Biofuels Act of 2006.
The said mandate called for a minimum blend of 10 percent locally-sourced ethanol blended with gasoline products, starting last year.
Among those that previously expressed interest in putting up ethanol plants prior to the DOE circular were JG Summit Corp., San Miguel Corp., First Pampanga Biofuels, Eastern Petroleum Corp. and Fuel Using Ethanol Ltd., among others.
Rose Marie Gumera, Sugar Regulatory Administration planning department manager, said that demand for ethanol this year is projected to grow to 500 million liters from 461 million liters in 2011.
However, the combined capacity of the country’s three existing plants, namely San Carlos Bioenergy, Inc., Leyte Agri Corp. and Roxol Bioenergy Corp., is only 79 million liters excluding the 54-million liter capacity of the ethanol facility that will be put up by Green Futures Innovations in March.
As such, Gumera said that the country would need 13 to 14 additional ethanol plants with a capacity of 30 million liters to fill demand.
“[The ethanol plants would require investments of] $2 billion each, including land development,” she added. Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala said that the new areas for ethanol crops will help the meet the requirement for bioethanol production and avoid conflict with existing areas dedicated to food production.
“The government is encouraging the wider use of renewable energy and the DA is deeply involved in finding areas for the massive cultivation of feedstock like sugar and sweet sorghum,” Alcala said also during the First Philippine International BioEnergy Conference.
He said that the government—through the National Convergence Initiative of the DA, Department of Agrarian Reform and the Department of Environment and Natural Resources—is finding land appropriate for the mass cultivation of sweet sorghum, sugarcane and other sources of bioethanol feedstock.
Experts have said that for sugarcane to be a major feedstock for ethanol, the best option is to use genetically-modified sugarcane like the Honeywell strain developed by the University of Queensland in Australia.
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