Fuel firms given until next year to comply with bioethanol blend

THE Department of Energy is giving gasoline companies until Feb. 6, 2012 to implement the 10 percent bioethanol blend per volume in all kind of gasoline sold in the country.

The move to use bioethanol blend with gasoline is in line with the the government’s aim to use and produce renewable energy in the country, said Mario Marasigan, Department of Energy director for renewable energy management bureau.

“In 2006 a law was passed called the ‘Biofuels Act of 2006’ or RA 9367. Under that law, they started implementation of 1 percent biodiesel blend in all gasolines on May 6, 2007 and increased to 2 percent in February 6, 2009. For the bioethanol, 5 percent blend was started on Feb. 6, 2009 and 10 percent supposedly starting Feb. 6, 2011,” Marasigan said.

The energy department gives gasoline companies a transition period from Aug. 6, 2011 to Feb. 6, 2012 to implement the 10 percent bioethanol blend.

He said that transition period could give oil companies time to put in place appropriate adjustments and logistics needed to implement the bioethanol blend.

After the transition period, the energy department will buy more mobile testing equipment so that it can strictly monitor gasoline firms complying with the bioethanol requirement.

“We will impose penalties to the gasoline companies that will not follow the requirement. They will not be able to import biofuels if they don’t get from the local supply,” Marasigan said.

The energy department however is initially starting the 10 percent blend on selected kinds of gasoline.

Marasigan said that the 10 percent blend wasn’t implemented on time because the department was awaiting more bioethanol producing companies to commit on how much they could supply.

“Once we get all their commitments we will then match them with the existing gasoline companies and make advisories as to the different gasoline companies on how much they will be allowed to import.”

At present, the total production of bioethanol in the country is only at 79 million liters from only three bioethanol companies that use sugar cane and molasses as their feedstock.

He said the capacity wouldn’t be enough once the energy department would implement the mandatory local bioethanol supplies to the gasoline companies.

“We target to increase the capacity because at 5 percentblend we need about 218.93 million liters that’s based on 2010 figures. Should we fully implement the 10 percent blend then we need about 460.63 million liters this year and about 536.29 million liters come 2015,” Marasigan said.

Marasigan said that the three accredited companies are Roxol Bioenergy Corp., Leyte Agri Corp., and San Carlos Bioethanol Plant. Reporter Aileen Garcia-Yap