BIOEN
International Examples Versão em português
Drawing Inspiration From International Examples
In response to a balance of payment crisis prompted by rapidly-rising oil prices in the mid-seventies, Brazil launched a comprehensive initiative aimed at decreasing reliance on imported energy. Thirty-four years later, the Brazilian economy - the 9th largest in the world - is virtually energy self-sufficient. A key part of the Brazilian strategy is using ethanol from sugar cane to replace imported oil as a source of transportation fuel. Since 1975, ethanol production in Brazil has increased 50-fold. Today, cane ethanol fuels about half of Brazil's light-duty fleet, and 94% of cars sold annually can run on either ethanol or gasoline (in Brazil gasoline has 25% ethanol added to it). Brazil uses about 3.5 MHa to grow sugar cane for ethanol production, representing 1% of the country's arable land. Life cycle greenhouse gas emissions from cane ethanol production are approaching an order of magnitude less than gasoline.
Although not based on biomass and not achieving greenhouse gas emission reductions, the development of South Africa's coal-based liquid fuel industry to the point that it provides about a third of the country's transportation fuel provides further indication that large-scale substitution for petroleum can be achieved.
As a result of efforts involving countries from around the world, large advances have been made in technology for production of biofuels from non-edible cellulosic biomass. This has led to many projects in many countries aimed at demonstration and commercialization of cellulosic biofuel production, often with coproduction of electricity. The emergence of cellulosic biofuel technology also leads to many new and relatively unexplored opportunities for integrated production of food/feed and bioenergy feedstocks, a key focus of the proposed project. Included in many of the most promising regions for production of cellulosic feedstocks are developing countries for whom oil imports represent a large economic burden.