Hawaii is trying to get into self sustained Ethanol production by setting up their own processing plant (which uses sugarcane as an input product), instead of having to import finished Ethanol from the main land.
They are however running into such problems as:
1. No workers to plant the sugarcane. From the original 2,500 workers it had during the early 90’s, only roughly 700 are remaining.
2. Delays in setting up the plant due to problems in sourcing the capital for setup, acquiring the permits and sourcing the input products. Although the local government has offered $12M a year in tax breaks, this will only be applicable once the plant is actually running.
3. Allocating the water to irrigate the proposed sugarcane plantations. Since the closure of the sugarcane in the 90’s the water
partitioned for their use has been allocated to other demand (create estuaries for marine life, support streamside agriculture, and for scenic and other values)
Original Article here
Category: Bioethanol
