April 21, 2008

US may rely on Brazilian ethanol as corn usage remains highly contested

Unless there are breakthroughs on the alternative sources for ethanol, the US has to import more Brazilian ethanol, which is made from sugarcane, analysts said.

Ethanol made from sugarcane outperforms corn in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, analysts pointed.

Aside from emission issues, critics have repeatedly pounded on the growing use of US corn for fuel as it is driving up food prices worldwide.

Corn, mostly for livestock feed, supplies more than 65 percent of world exports.

Alexander Karsner, the assistant secretary in charge of renewable energy and efficiency at the US Department of Energy, said his office is encouraging ethanol from plant cellulose to slow global warming.

A study by Tim Searchinger, a visiting scholar at the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University, and other scientists found that most biofuels are likely to produce more greenhouse gases than the gasoline they replace because carbon dioxide will be released when farmers plow and burn forest or grassland to grow the fuels or to grow food to replace crops that were eliminated by the demand for ethanol.

The US ethanol industry aims to produce 8.5 billion gallons this year, almost all of it from corn.

The world's ethanol today is mainly from US corn or Brazilian sugarcane.

Searchinger reported that even when land use changes were taken into account, sugarcane, if grown under the right conditions, could reduce emissions.