Thailand: Hunt on for low-cost ethanol

Thailand: Hunt on for low-cost ethanol

Thai Roong Ruang Sugar Group is seeking technology to produce ethanol from
an alternative raw material, bagasse, in order to make use of waste from the
sugar industry and increase Thailand's ethanol production at a lower cost.

The company's executive director Ugrit Asadathorn said Thai Roong Ruang has
been working on the project for more than a decade, in close cooperation
with Japan's New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization
(Nedo).

Nedo is an organisation that plays a major role in Japan's economic and
industrial policies as one of the largest public research and development
management groups. It has two basic missions: addressing energy and global
environmental problems and enhancing industrial technology.

"We realise that demand for molasses is higher, and Thailand has limited
molasses, making the price of the material to be higher and pushing the cost
of molasses-made ethanol to rise in the same direction," Mr Ugrit said. "So,
we are trying to produce ethanol from other raw material with lower cost."

The price of molasses, a byproduct of sugar production, has been rising
continuously over the past several years due to an increase in demand for it
by two major industries of liqueur and ethanol, which pounce on whatever
limited amount of molasses is available.

The price of molasses has risen to about 5,000 baht a tonne, up from 1,000
baht a tonne 10 years ago.

The rising molasses price means increase in production costs for
molasses-made ethanol, pushing the price to 24.50 baht a litre, compared
with 20 baht a litre in the previous decade.

Thailand also needs to rev up its ethanol production to secure its ethanol
supply for its energy sector. Policymakers have set up a clear plan to add
more ethanol proportion in the gasohol from 10% to 20% and up to 85%.

Thailand currently produces around 3.3 million litres per day, while demand
stands at 3.2 million litres per day.

The project aims to produce ethanol from bagasse, a dry pulpy residue left
after extraction of juice from sugar cane.

Mr Ugrit said the company has been working with Nedo in developing a new
type of enzyme to help degenerate carbohydrate in bagasse into alcohol, or
ethanol.

"We have had success in the lab using a special type of enzyme to rot
bagasse and produce ethanol," he said. "But the problem is, we can't produce
this type of enzyme [locally] and need to import it, making the production
costs stay high."

Mr Ugrit said Thai Roong Ruang and Nedo then developed a different type of
enzyme on their own and finally succeeded in producing ethanol from bagasse.

"At this stage, we can say that we can produce ethanol from bagasse, but
only in the lab," he said. "The most difficult thing is how to produce it in
a large scale for commercial purpose."

Mr Ugrit said there are several factors preventing the company from
producing ethanol on a commercial scale as it is very difficult to keep
small bacteria in the air or any other contaminated stuff from leaking into
the production process.

He said the company would also have to spend a long time as well as make a
massive investment to build up a new factory and other needed facilities to
produce ethanol from bagasse.

"It would need up to 1-2 billion baht of investment to expand production
from the lab scale to commercial scale," he said.

Apart from the huge investment budget, the current energy price situation
has made the company sit back and rethink investing in the project, since
weak global oil prices are unlikely to encourage motorists to care much
about biofuels blended in petrol to make petrol prices cheaper, Mr Ugrit
said.

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Link to Original Article:
http://www.bangkokpost.com/business/news/1267539/hunt-on-for-low-cost-ethano
l

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John Diecker
APT Consulting Group Co., Ltd.

www.aptthailand.com