Philippines may speed up biodiesel plan

18 October 2007 10:29  [Source: ICIS news]

SINGAPORE (ICIS news)--The government of the Philippines might speed up the use of more biodiesel in its fuel, increasing its content to 10% in 2009, an industry official said on Thursday.

 

The government, which started the use of a 1% biodiesel (B1) in May this year, had planned to raise it to 2% in 2009 and 10% in 2011, Wilfredo Toledo, general manager of Petron’s technical department, said on the sidelines of a two-day ethanol and biofuels conference that ends on Thursday.

  

Biodiesel supply in the Philippines was sufficient for B1, but more plants might be needed for higher blends, he added.

 

The move to biofuels was to reduce the country’s 100% dependency on imported crude, improve health and the environment and to drive economic growth in the countryside, he said.

 

It planned to start blending bioethanol into its gasoline in the second quarter of 2009, Toledo said, adding that the country was still building ethanol plants.

 

Petron planned to import ethanol first, but has also inked an offtake agreement with Bronzeoak which was building a 125,000 litres/day plant in the country, he said.

 

The refiner has already met several challenges such as product quality, the lack of infrastructure and supply reliability, when implementing the use of B1, Toledo said.

 

Biofuels were also not subsidised, but the company would push ahead with necessary investment so as to maintain its market share, he added.

 

Biodiesel in the Philippines

Company	Annual volume (m litres)
Chemrez	60.0
Senbel Fine Chemicals	36.0
Romtron	0.3
Mt Holy Coco	4.0
New Plants (Estimated)	44.6
Total	144.9
Petron Requirement @ 1%	22.4
Industry Requirement @ 1%	62.2*

*Assuming Petron’s market share is 36%

Source: Petron

By: Florence Tan
+65 6780 4359

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