São Paulo – The Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES) announced on Thursday (17) the signing of an agreement with the Studies and Projects Funding Body (Finep), an organisation under the Ministry of Science and Technology, to make available 1 billion Brazilian reals (US$ 597 million) in credit for technological innovation projects in the sugar and alcohol sector in the period from 2011 to 2014.
The objective is to provide incentives to the development of new fuels from sugarcane, especially the so-called 2nd Generation ethanol, obtained from pulp. The programme was named Joint Plan for Support to Industrial Technological Innovation in the Sugar-Energy and Sucrochemical Sectors (Paiss).
The initiative, according to the bank, is the result of the Brazilian government’s objective of raising the country to an equivalent level of importance in more advanced technologies as it has in the case of production of conventional biofuels, like ethanol and biodiesel.
In this respect, according to the BNDES, the program should have three fronts of operation: 2nd generation ethanol produced from biomass, that is, the bagasse that is left after production of sugar and of conventional ethanol, the development of new products from the same raw material and gasification.
The bank said that there is a technological race in this area in which the participants are the United States and European Union and added that if no expansion is made, Brazil may lose the leadership it has in the field of biofuels.
According to the BNDES, the investment portfolio in ethanol sector technology development is 413.5 million Brazilian reals (US$ 247 million). With the new program, the volume will be more than doubled. According to the bank, the value takes Brazil close to the volume invested by the US and EU.
The credit, according to the BNDES, may be sought by companies turned to the introduction of new products and services to the market. The cost of the enterprises should vary according to the project.
*Translated by Mark Ament
