National Biofuels Board (NBB) vice chairman and Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) administrator, Rafael Coscolluela, said that the Philippines will need to build eight bioethanol plants with an average capacity of 30 million liters/year inorder to meet the required 208 million liters of bioethanol for 2009 as defined in the country’s Biofuel Law.
In line with this, the NBB is encouraging foreign investors to come in an invest in the emerging biofuel industry of the Philippines. The biofuel law itself offers fiscal and other incentives to investors in the Biofuel Industry.
Within the next five years, the Philippine will also need somewhere between 15 to 18 bioethanol plants to further meet the increasing biofuel requirements as defined by the Biofuel Law. This total capacity requirement would carry with it an investment of about P70 billion.
Currently there are only two existing bioethanol plants producing ethanol. They are located in Negros Occidental and Ormoc, Leyte and have a combined capacity of only 39 million liters. In order to meet the requirement of the Biofuel Law, gasoline retailers are allowed to import bioethanol from foreign suppliers.
The Philippine Biofuel Bill calls for mandatory mixing of 1% of Biodiesel in Diesel and 5% of Bioethanol in Gasoline for the first 4 years. It will then be increased to 2% for Biodiesel and 10% for Ethanol.
Copy of the Philippine Biofuels Bill can be found here.
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Category: Biodiesel, Bioethanol, Biofuel
