Ethanol Plant opened in Jamaica
Minister of Commerce,
Science and Technology,
Phillip Paulwell
Wednesday, November 30, 2005
The Petroleum Corporation of Jamaica (Petrojam) opened
its Ethanol Dehydration Plant on Marcus Garvey Drive in Kingston last week.
The plant will supply the United States with 150 million litres of ethanol per
year.
Another 220 million litres of capacity are to be added,
with 70 million of this coming in the long run. Otacilio Coser Filho, director
at Coinex, the Brazilian firm that is a partner in the plant, promised that
further expansion would be forthcoming.
According to Phillip Paulwell, the Minister of Commerce,
Science and Technology, the plant provides an opportunity for the local sugar
industry to profit from the refinery. Ethanol is produced from sugar cane
although initially all the feedstock will be supplied by the Brazil-based
Coinex.
Mr Paulwell said that this provides an opportunity for
the sugar industry to increase its output without the restriction of quotas.
This, according to Petrojam, would require the planting
of 9,000 additional hectares of sugar cane, to supply 57 million litres for
local gasoline.
Chairman of the All-Island Cane Farmers Association,
Allan Rickards welcomed the development saying, “… we will, of course, have to
wait until they actually start using local feedstock so that any further
planting can begin. We are certainly anxious.”
The Government has a long-term target of gasoline being
made of 25 per cent ethanol, the same proportion as used in Brazil.
Under the 1983 Caribbean Basin Economic Recovery Act (CBERA),
ethanol produced in Jamaica, unlike Brazil, will avoid US import duty of
US$0.54 per gallon.
Brazil is the world’s largest ethanol producer,
responsible for 36 per cent of the world’s total production in 2004, and
Coinex, the country’s largest producer.
World demand for ethanol is expected to reach 130 billion
litres by 2020.
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