Basic Petroleum is targeting their 200,000 li/day distillery to start producing by 2009, once their Zambo Norte BioEnergy Corp goes on line. Ideally, if permitting weren’t an issue and other regulatory requirements won’t be stalled, you would be able to get a distillery up and running in a years time. With distillery construction running tandem with the feedstock planting and harvest scheduling.
The bigger the capacity, the more you would have to spend in planting as much hectarage/day in order to meet your requirement. On average you can get about 5900 li/ha for sugarcane based ethanol. So in order to meet the 200,000 li/day you would have to plant about 34 ha/day (assume 100% yield) as well as harvest the same amount.
With that much hectarage being planted per day it would really boost the agricultural sector and its downstream industries. I’m seeing demands for farm hands as well as farm equipment and trucking services in the near future. And that’s not even talking about the demand for fertilizer, irrigation and other yield improving services.
If you are going for the growership method, wherein you outsource your feedstock to farmers. As much as possible you want them to be planting at the same time so that you will only harvest once in their area. Effectively cutting down on transportation costs.
Of course my opinion in distillery design is to always make it flexible enough to accept multiple feedstocks. Because the price of some feedstock used also as consumer goods could turn volatile and you wouldn’t want that affecting your bottom line. I think that fact alone could justify the cost of a multiple-input plant.
Once again my apologies to Philstar for lifting their article since their archiving system doesn’t work so well.
Category: Bioethanol, AsiaBasic Petroleum targets ethanol output by 2009
By Zinnia B. Dela Peña
Friday, June 22, 2007Basic Petroleum Corp. expects its ethanol plant to be fully operational by the last quarter of 2009, the company told the Philippine Stock Exchange yesterday.
The plant, which will produce 200,000 liters of ethanol per day, is intended for local consumption although the company is open to exporting to other countries, the company added.
The planned facility is in line with the group’s thrust to venture into renewable and alternative energies.
With its foray into green energy, the company plans to change its name to Basic Energy Corp. with Zambo Norte BioEnergy Corp. (ZNOC) as one of its subsidiaries.
Basic Petroleum, however, said it will continue to pursue oil and gas exploration even as it diversified into the energy business.
The company’s board earlier approved the acquisition of ZNBC, a subsidiary of ZN Biofuels Partners Inc. for P120 million, to be funded through cash and shares of Basic Petroleum.
ZNBC is engaged in sugarcane plantation for ethanol production. Its assets include a 22-hectare site for its proposed plant and more than 6,000 hectares of leased land in Zamboanga del Norte, which will also be planted with sugarcane.
Basic Petroleum has also earmarked an additional 4,000 hectares of land in the province that will be dedicated for ethanol production. [source]
