Monday, September 8, 2008

The bioethanol distillery, scheduled for commercial operations by 2010, is so far the nearest bioethanol production facility to Metro Manila. The distillery will be located in Barangay Caluangan, Magallanes town, Cavite.

Bio-ethanol is alcohol produced from sugarcane and other crops such as corn, cassava, and sweet sorghum. It is one of the government`s alternative fuels that aims to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The facility is situated close to the oil refineries in Batangas and the Pandacan depot and the demand centers of Metro Manila and South Luzon, which comprise nearly 60 percent of the total ethanol demand of the Philippines.

Its proximity to the processing sites will address the issue of transport cost.

On Sept. 8, Cavite Biofuels and the cooperative will launch a joint nursery as part of the sugarcane expansion program that the group has undertaken to supplement existing plantations in the third district of Cavite.

Senator Juan Miguel Zubiri, the lead author of the landmark Biofuels Law, will deliver the keynote address of the event. The law mandates a minimum of 10 percent ethanol blend to gasoline starting next year.

The cooperative is a special purpose company incorporated in January to develop, construct, own and operate an integrated ethanol distillery and power cogeneration plant with a capacity of 125,000 liters of ethanol per day and a daily electrical output of approximately 5 megawatts for internal energy requirements.

The plant is fully integrated and designed to ensure optimum energy efficiency. It includes a cane mill, distillery, cogeneration plant, carbon dioxide recovery plant, anaerobic digestion plant and fuel ethanol storage and loading facilities.

By-products include electricity for internal use, food grade CO2 which is captured for sale and fertilizer produced from the liquid effluent and solid waste, which is given back to the cane suppliers. Alena Mae S. Flores