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Non-Tech : $2 or higher gas - Can ethanol make a comeback? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: richardred who wrote (2394)	3/16/2007 11:17:01 AM
From: richardred	Respond to of 2801

Brazil's Petrobras to start ethanol production from bagasse font size ZoomIn ZoomOut Brazil's state-owned oil and gas company Petrobras announced on Thursday that it will start producing ethanol from bagasse in its research center in Rio de Janeiro. A pioneering plant will start operating in May 2007, and another plant to produce ethanol from bagasse on industrial scale is expected to be inaugurated in 2008, said Silas Oliva, executive of Petrobras Ethanol project. "Petrobras' studies in the area began about five years ago. Another local private company Dedini, a manufacturer of equipments for the biofuel sector, is also carrying out research on that type of ethanol, which derives from lignocellulosic biomass found in bagasse," Oliva said, adding that although such raw material is rather cheap in Brazil, the process of producing the fuel is still expensive. Oliva also stressed that Japan and Brazil have been negotiating partnerships in the ethanol field for years. Petrobras and Japan's state-owned Nippon Alcohol Banhai have created the joint venture Brazil-Japan Ethanol in 2005. The Brazilian giant signed this month a memorandum with the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) on sugarcane culture, logistics and plants, aiming at increasing ethanol exports to the eastern country. "Petrobras expects to send its first products (20 million liters) of anhydrous alcohol to Japan in 2007," the executive said. Petrobras also expects to export 850 million liters of anhydrous alcohol to Nigeria and Venezuela this year, up from 120 million in 2006, and to start exporting the products to the United States as well, he added. Source: Xinhua english.people.com.cn