P3.3-B bioethanol distillery to rise in Cavite

Cavite Biofuels Producers Inc. (CBPI), in partnership with the Cavite Sugarcane Planters Multi-Purpose Cooperative (CSPMPC), will invest P3.3 billion to develop a 125,000 liter-per-day bioethanol distillery in Magallanes town.

Scheduled for commercial operations in 2010, the plant will become the nearest bioethanol production facility to Metro Manila.

On Sept. 8, CBPI and CSPMPC will be launching a joint sugarcane nursery as part of a sugarcane expansion program the group has undertaken to supplement the existing sugarcane plantations in the Third District of Cavite.

CBPI is a special purpose company formed in January 2008 to develop, construct, own and operate an integrated ethanol distillery and power cogeneration plant with a capacity of 125,000 liters of ethanol per day and a daily electrical output of approximately five megawatts for internal energy requirements. 

The bioethanol distillery will be located in Bgy. Caluangan in Magallanes, Cavite, a province South of Metro Manila.

The plant is afully integrated and designed to ensure optimum energy efficiency. It includes a cane mill, distillery, cogeneration plant, carbon dioxide (CO2) recovery plant, anaerobic digestion (AD) plant and fuel ethanol storage and loading facilities. 

Its by-products include electricity for internal use; food grade CO2; fertilizer produced from the liquid effluent and solid waste, which is given back to the cane suppliers.

Cane will be sourced from a maximum area of about 6,000 hectares primarily from the towns of Magallanes and Maragondon.

The ethanol facility is situated close to the oil refineries in Batangas and Pandacan, Manila and to the demand centers of Metro Manila and South Luzon, which comprise nearly 60 percent of the total ethanol demand of the Philippines.

While transport cost has been a prime concern of most commodity movements, the ethanol facility’s proximity to the processing sites and the car-using public addresses this issue.

Antonio Lopa, CBPI president, said one of the benefits of the CBPI bioethanol project will be its contribution to the country’s fuel security.

With its output of locally-produced fuel ethanol, the facility will be able to displace more than 40 million liters of gasoline per year, which lessens the country’s dependence on imported fuel.

Because the Philippines is almost totally dependent on imported petroleum, the recent upsurge in world oil prices had a huge impact on the local pump prices of gasoline and diesel.

CSPMPC chairman Filomeno Maligaya also expressed enthusiasm over the project, saying the project will inject new life to the people of Cavite by spurring capital investment, improving infrastructure, creating new employment opportunities and increasing the income of farmers.

Cavite farmers have been plagued for years by high production costs, lack of farm-to-market roads, vulnerability to storms and flooding, and a prohibitive distance to the nearest sugar mill, which is more than 70 kilometers away.