Wind power in Brazil
Encyclopedia
Renewable energy
in Brazil
accounted for more than 85.4% of the domestically-produced energy used in Brazil, according to preliminary data from the 2009 National Energy Balance, conducted by the Energy Research Corporation (EPE). After the oil shocks of the 1970s, Brazil started focusing on developing alternative sources of energy, mainly sugarcane ethanol
. Its large sugarcane farms helped a lot. In 1985, 91% of cars produced that year ran on sugarcane ethanol. The success of flexible-fuel vehicle
s, introduced in 2003, together with the mandatory E25 blend throughout the country, have allowed ethanol fuel consumption in the country to achieve a 50% market share of the gasoline-powered fleet by February 2008.
Brazil held its first wind
-only energy auction in 2009, in a move to diversify its energy portfolio. Foreign companies scrambled to take part. Early this decade, a drought in Brazil that cut water to the country's hydroelectric dams prompted severe energy shortages. The crisis, which ravaged the country's economy and led to electricity rationing, underscored Brazil's pressing need to diversify away from water power. The bidding is expected to lead to the construction of two gigawatts of wind production with an investment of about US$ 6 billion of over the next two years. Brazil counts on hydroelectricity
for more than 3/4 of its electricity
, but authorities are pushing biomass
and wind as primary alternatives. Wind energy's greatest potential in Brazil is during the dry season, so it is considered a hedge against low rainfall and the geographical spread of existing hydro resources. Brazil's technical potential for wind energy
is 143 gigawatts due to the country's blustery 4,600-mile coastline
, where most projects are based. The Brazilian Wind Energy Association and the government have set a goal of achieving 10 gigawatts of wind energy capacity by 2020 from the current 605 megawatts, with another 450 megawatts under construction. The industry hopes the auction will help kick-start the wind-energy sector, which already accounts for 70% of the total in all of Latin America
.
in Brazil amounts to an installed capacity of 602 MW at the end of 2009, enough to power a city about 300 thousand residences. The 36 windparks and windfarm
s in the country, in 2009, were located in Northeastern Brazil (5 States), Southern Brazil (3 States), and Southeastern Brazil (1 State). Potential
of wind
in Brazil is more intense from June to December, coinciding with the months of lower rainfall intensity. This puts the wind as a potential supplementary source of energy generated by hydroelectric. In 2009, 10 projects are under construction, with a capacity of 256 MW, and in 2010, 45 started the construction to generate 2,139 MW, in several States. The U.S. company General Electric
has one industry in Brazil, in the city of Campinas
, and one partnership with the Tecsis in Sorocaba
, meeting the demand of the new projects.
While the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference
(COP15) was taking place in Copenhagen
, Brazil's National Electric Energy Agency (ANEEL) held the country's first ever wind-only energy auction. On December 14, around 1,800 megawatts (MW) were contracted with energy from 71 wind power plants scheduled to be delivered beginning July 1, 2012. While focusing domestically on wind-energy generation, Brazil is part of a larger international movement toward wind power as a primary source of energy. In fact, wind power has seen the highest expansion rate of all available renewable energy sources, with an average growth of 27% per year since 1990, according to the Global Wind Energy Council
(GWEC).
was installed in Fernando de Noronha
Archipelago
in 1992. Ten years later the government created the Program for Incentive of Alternative Electric Energy Sources (Proinfa) to encourage the use of other renewable sources, such as wind power, biomass, and Small Hydroelectric Power Stations (PCHs). Such stations use hydropower, the flagship of Brazil's energy matrix, which comprises around three-quarters of Brazil's installed energy capacity.
High energy production costs, coupled with the advantages of wind power as a renewable, widely available energy source, have led several countries to establish regulatory incentives and direct financial investments to stimulate wind power generation.
Developing these wind power sources in Brazil is helping the country to meet its strategic objectives of enhancing energy security
, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and creating jobs. The potential for this type of power generation in Brazil could reach up to 145,000 MW, according to the 2001 Brazilian Wind Power Potential Report by the Electric Energy Research Center (Cepel).
continues to pose a significant challenge to the growth of wind energy. The price per megawatt hour (MWh) established in Brazil's auction of wind power reserve supply is R$189, while the cap defined in bidding for power plants of the Madeira River
Hydroelectricity Complex was R$ 91 (UHE Jirau) in 2008, and R$ 122 (UHE Santo Antonio) in 2007. These hydroelectricity prices were marked down by up to 35% in the 2008 and 2007 auctions; the energy supply was negotiated at R$ 71.4/MWh in the case of Jirau, and R$ 78.9/MWh for the Santo Antonio plant.
dividing Brazil and Paraguay
, the Itaipu Dam is the world's largest hydroelectric dam. The river runs long the border of the two countries, and during the initial diplomatic talks of constructing the dam both countries were suffering from droughts. The original goal was to provide better management and utilization over water resources for the use of irrigation of crops. Argentina
was also later incorporated in some of the governmental planning and agreements because it is a directly affected, being down stream, by the regulation of the water on the river. If the dam were to completely open the water flow, areas as far south as Buenos Aires
could potentially flood. Construction of the dam started in 1975, and the first generator was opened in 1983. Today, the dam provides over 75% of Paraguay's electric power needs, and meets nearly 25% of Brazil's electricity demands. It is estimated that 10,000 locals were displaced by the construction of the dam, and around 40,000 people were hired to help with the construction of the project. Many environmental concerns were overlooked when constructing the dam because the dam would produce such a large amount of energy with carbon free emissions, and no unwanted byproducts, such as with nuclear energy
.
.
Trying not to use too much energy during peak hours, between 6 and 9 PM, is necessary to avoid the need to build new energy plants and transmission lines only to serve the demand in that timeframe. New dams mean very elevated social and environmental costs due to flooding land tracts and destroying habitats of animals, plants and entire communities that, many times, are not compensated (resettlement or indemnities). Large hydroelectric power plants flooding immense forest
areas emit large amounts of methane to the atmosphere. There is only sustainable development with energy coming from new renewable sources. Small hydroelectric plants can produce energy in a decentralized way with small environmental impact. Such an option can be implemented in several regions of the country making use of natural waterfalls. Many Brazilian farmers chose this.
program started in 1975, when soaring oil prices put a chokehold on the ecoom sugar cane was an obvious candidate, given Brazil's almost endless amount of arable land
and favourable climate.
Most cars on the road today in Brazil can run on blends of up to 25% ethanol, and motor vehicle manufacturers already produce vehicles designed to run on much higher ethanol blends. Most car makers in Brazil sell flexible-fuel cars, trucks, and minivans that can use gasoline
and ethanol blends ranging from pure gasoline up to 100% ethanol (E100). In 2009, 90% of cars produced that year ran on sugarcane ethanol
.
Brazil is the second largest producer of ethanol in the world and is the largest exporter of the fuel. In 2008, Brazil produced 454,000 bbl/d of ethanol, up from 365,000 in 2007. All gasoline in Brazil contains ethanol, with blending levels varying from 20-25%. Over half of all cars in the country are of the flex-fuel variety, meaning that they can run on 100 percent ethanol or an ethanol-gasoline mixture. According to ANP, Brazil also produced about 20,000 bbl/d of biodiesel
in 2008, and the agency has enacted a three-percent blending requirement for domestic diesel sales.
The importance of ethanol in Brazil's domestic transportation fuels market will only increase in the future. According to Petrobrás
, ethanol accounts for more than 50 percent of current light vehicle fuel demand, and the company expects this to increase to over 80% by 2020. Because ethanol production continues to grow faster than domestic demand, Brazil has sought to increase ethanol exports. According to industry sources, Brazil's ethanol exports reached 86,000 bbl/d in 2008, with 13,000 bbl/d going to the United States
. Brazil is the largest ethanol exporter in the world, holding over 90% of the global export market.
is a clean energy source used in Brazil. It reduces environmental pollution as it uses organic garbage, agricultural remains, wood
shaving or vegetal oil. Refuse cane, with its high energetic value, has been used to produce electricity. More than 1 million people in the country works in the production of Biomass, and this energy represents 27% of Brazil's energetic matrix.
The recent interest in converting biomass to electricity comes not only from its potential as a low-cost, indigenous supply of power, but for its potential environmental and developmental benefits. For example, biomass may be a globally important mitigation option to reduce the rate of CO2 buildup by sequestering carbon and by displacing fossil fuels. Renewably-grown biomass contributes only a very small amount of carbon
to the atmosphere
. Locally, plantations can lessen soil erosion, provide a means to restore degraded lands, offset emissions and local impacts from fossil-fired power generation, and, perhaps, reduce demands on existing forests. In addition to the direct power and environmental benefits, biomass energy systems offer numerous other benefits, especially for developing countries, such as Brazil. Some of these benefits include the employment of underutilized labor and the production of co- and by-products, for example, fuelwood.
Nearly all of the experience with biomass for power generation is based on the use of waste
and residue fuels (primarily wood/wood wastes and agricultural residues). The production of electric power from plantation
grown wood is an emerging technology with considerable promise. However, actual commercial use of plantation-grown fuels for power generation is limited to a few isolated experiences. Wood from plantations is not an inexpensive energy feedstock, and as long as worldwide prices of coal, oil and gas are relatively low, the establishment of plantations dedicated to supplying electric power or other higher forms of energy will occur only where financial subsidies or incentives exist or where other sources of energy are not available.
The biomass plantations are supplying energy on a commercial basis, such as in Brazil, the Philippines
and Sweden
, it can be shown that a combination of government policies and/or high conventional energy prices have stimulated the use of short-rotation plantations for energy. Brazil used tax incentives beginning in the mid-1960s to initiate a reforestation program to provide for industrial wood energy and wood product needs. As a consequence of the Brazilian Forestry Code with its favourable tax incentives, the planted forest area in Brazil increased from 470,000 ha to 6.5 million ha by 1993. With the discontinuation of the tax incentives in 1988, plantation establishment in Brazil has slowed although the commercial feasibility of using eucalyptus
for energy and other products has been clearly demonstrated.
Renewable energy
Renewable energy is energy which comes from natural resources such as sunlight, wind, rain, tides, and geothermal heat, which are renewable . About 16% of global final energy consumption comes from renewables, with 10% coming from traditional biomass, which is mainly used for heating, and 3.4% from...
in Brazil
Brazil
Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...
accounted for more than 85.4% of the domestically-produced energy used in Brazil, according to preliminary data from the 2009 National Energy Balance, conducted by the Energy Research Corporation (EPE). After the oil shocks of the 1970s, Brazil started focusing on developing alternative sources of energy, mainly sugarcane ethanol
Ethanol fuel in Brazil
Brazil is the world's second largest producer of ethanol fuel and the world's largest exporter. Together, Brazil and the United States lead the industrial production of ethanol fuel, accounting together for 87.8% of the world's production in 2010. In 2010 Brazil produced 26.2 billion litres Brazil...
. Its large sugarcane farms helped a lot. In 1985, 91% of cars produced that year ran on sugarcane ethanol. The success of flexible-fuel vehicle
Flexible-fuel vehicle
A flexible-fuel vehicle or dual-fuel vehicle is an alternative fuel vehicle with an internal combustion engine designed to run on more than one fuel, usually gasoline blended with either ethanol or methanol fuel, and both fuels are stored in the same common tank...
s, introduced in 2003, together with the mandatory E25 blend throughout the country, have allowed ethanol fuel consumption in the country to achieve a 50% market share of the gasoline-powered fleet by February 2008.
Brazil held its first wind
Wind
Wind is the flow of gases on a large scale. On Earth, wind consists of the bulk movement of air. In outer space, solar wind is the movement of gases or charged particles from the sun through space, while planetary wind is the outgassing of light chemical elements from a planet's atmosphere into space...
-only energy auction in 2009, in a move to diversify its energy portfolio. Foreign companies scrambled to take part. Early this decade, a drought in Brazil that cut water to the country's hydroelectric dams prompted severe energy shortages. The crisis, which ravaged the country's economy and led to electricity rationing, underscored Brazil's pressing need to diversify away from water power. The bidding is expected to lead to the construction of two gigawatts of wind production with an investment of about US$ 6 billion of over the next two years. Brazil counts on hydroelectricity
Hydroelectricity
Hydroelectricity is the term referring to electricity generated by hydropower; the production of electrical power through the use of the gravitational force of falling or flowing water. It is the most widely used form of renewable energy...
for more than 3/4 of its electricity
Electricity
Electricity is a general term encompassing a variety of phenomena resulting from the presence and flow of electric charge. These include many easily recognizable phenomena, such as lightning, static electricity, and the flow of electrical current in an electrical wire...
, but authorities are pushing biomass
Biomass
Biomass, as a renewable energy source, is biological material from living, or recently living organisms. As an energy source, biomass can either be used directly, or converted into other energy products such as biofuel....
and wind as primary alternatives. Wind energy's greatest potential in Brazil is during the dry season, so it is considered a hedge against low rainfall and the geographical spread of existing hydro resources. Brazil's technical potential for wind energy
Wind energy
Wind energy is the kinetic energy of air in motion; see also wind power.Total wind energy flowing through an imaginary area A during the time t is:E = ½ m v2 = ½ v 2...
is 143 gigawatts due to the country's blustery 4,600-mile coastline
Coastline of Brazil
The coastline of Brazil measures 7,491 km, which makes it the 16th longest national coastline of the world. All the coast lies adjacent to the Atlantic Ocean....
, where most projects are based. The Brazilian Wind Energy Association and the government have set a goal of achieving 10 gigawatts of wind energy capacity by 2020 from the current 605 megawatts, with another 450 megawatts under construction. The industry hopes the auction will help kick-start the wind-energy sector, which already accounts for 70% of the total in all of Latin America
Latin America
Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...
.
Wind power
Wind powerWind power
Wind power is the conversion of wind energy into a useful form of energy, such as using wind turbines to make electricity, windmills for mechanical power, windpumps for water pumping or drainage, or sails to propel ships....
in Brazil amounts to an installed capacity of 602 MW at the end of 2009, enough to power a city about 300 thousand residences. The 36 windparks and windfarm
WindFarm
WindFarm is wind energy software used to analyse, design, optimise and visualise wind farms. It calculates and optimises the energy yield subject to natural, planning and engineering constraints. WindFarm has the wind modelling software MS-Micro integrated. MS-Micro is based on the same...
s in the country, in 2009, were located in Northeastern Brazil (5 States), Southern Brazil (3 States), and Southeastern Brazil (1 State). Potential
Potential
*In linguistics, the potential mood*The mathematical study of potentials is known as potential theory; it is the study of harmonic functions on manifolds...
of wind
Wind
Wind is the flow of gases on a large scale. On Earth, wind consists of the bulk movement of air. In outer space, solar wind is the movement of gases or charged particles from the sun through space, while planetary wind is the outgassing of light chemical elements from a planet's atmosphere into space...
in Brazil is more intense from June to December, coinciding with the months of lower rainfall intensity. This puts the wind as a potential supplementary source of energy generated by hydroelectric. In 2009, 10 projects are under construction, with a capacity of 256 MW, and in 2010, 45 started the construction to generate 2,139 MW, in several States. The U.S. company General Electric
General Electric
General Electric Company , or GE, is an American multinational conglomerate corporation incorporated in Schenectady, New York and headquartered in Fairfield, Connecticut, United States...
has one industry in Brazil, in the city of Campinas
Campinas
Campinas is a city and municipality located in the coastal interior of the state of São Paulo, Brazil. is the administrative center of the meso-region of the same name, with 3,783,597 inhabitants as of the 2010 Census, consisting of 49 cities....
, and one partnership with the Tecsis in Sorocaba
Sorocaba
Sorocaba is a city in the state of São Paulo, Brazil. Sorocaba is the fourth largest city in the state of São Paulo. Outside the Greater São Paulo region, it ranks behind only Campinas, Sao Jose dos Campos and Ribeirão Preto...
, meeting the demand of the new projects.
While the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference
2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference
The 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference, commonly known as the Copenhagen Summit, was held at the Bella Center in Copenhagen, Denmark, between 7 December and 18 December. The conference included the 15th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate...
(COP15) was taking place in Copenhagen
Copenhagen
Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,199,224 and a metropolitan population of 1,930,260 . With the completion of the transnational Øresund Bridge in 2000, Copenhagen has become the centre of the increasingly integrating Øresund Region...
, Brazil's National Electric Energy Agency (ANEEL) held the country's first ever wind-only energy auction. On December 14, around 1,800 megawatts (MW) were contracted with energy from 71 wind power plants scheduled to be delivered beginning July 1, 2012. While focusing domestically on wind-energy generation, Brazil is part of a larger international movement toward wind power as a primary source of energy. In fact, wind power has seen the highest expansion rate of all available renewable energy sources, with an average growth of 27% per year since 1990, according to the Global Wind Energy Council
Global Wind Energy Council
The Global Wind Energy Council was established in 2005 to provide a credible and representative forum for the entire wind energy sector at an international level...
(GWEC).
Government support
Brazil's first wind-energy turbineTurbine
A turbine is a rotary engine that extracts energy from a fluid flow and converts it into useful work.The simplest turbines have one moving part, a rotor assembly, which is a shaft or drum with blades attached. Moving fluid acts on the blades, or the blades react to the flow, so that they move and...
was installed in Fernando de Noronha
Fernando de Noronha
Fernando de Noronha is an archipelago of 21 islands and islets in the Atlantic Ocean, offshore from the Brazilian coast. The main island has an area of and had a population of 3,012 in the year 2010...
Archipelago
Archipelago
An archipelago , sometimes called an island group, is a chain or cluster of islands. The word archipelago is derived from the Greek ἄρχι- – arkhi- and πέλαγος – pélagos through the Italian arcipelago...
in 1992. Ten years later the government created the Program for Incentive of Alternative Electric Energy Sources (Proinfa) to encourage the use of other renewable sources, such as wind power, biomass, and Small Hydroelectric Power Stations (PCHs). Such stations use hydropower, the flagship of Brazil's energy matrix, which comprises around three-quarters of Brazil's installed energy capacity.
High energy production costs, coupled with the advantages of wind power as a renewable, widely available energy source, have led several countries to establish regulatory incentives and direct financial investments to stimulate wind power generation.
Growth of wind energy
Since the inception of Proinfa, Brazil's wind energy production has escalated from 22 MW in 2003 to 602 MW in 2009, as part of 36 private projects. Another 10 projects are under construction, with a capacity of 256.4 MW, and 45 additional projects have been approved be ANEEL with an estimated potential of 2,139.7 MW.Developing these wind power sources in Brazil is helping the country to meet its strategic objectives of enhancing energy security
Energy security
Energy security is a term for an association between national security and the availability of natural resources for energy consumption. Access to cheap energy has become essential to the functioning of modern economies. However, the uneven distribution of energy supplies among countries has led...
, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and creating jobs. The potential for this type of power generation in Brazil could reach up to 145,000 MW, according to the 2001 Brazilian Wind Power Potential Report by the Electric Energy Research Center (Cepel).
Cost
The cost of energy productionEnergy economics
Energy economics is a broad scientific subject area which includes topics related to supply and use of energy in societies. Due to diversity of issues and methods applied and shared with a number of academic disciplines, energy economics does not present itself as a self contained academic...
continues to pose a significant challenge to the growth of wind energy. The price per megawatt hour (MWh) established in Brazil's auction of wind power reserve supply is R$189, while the cap defined in bidding for power plants of the Madeira River
Madeira River
The Madeira River is a major waterway in South America, approximately 3,250 km miles long The Madeira is the biggest tributary of the Amazon...
Hydroelectricity Complex was R$ 91 (UHE Jirau) in 2008, and R$ 122 (UHE Santo Antonio) in 2007. These hydroelectricity prices were marked down by up to 35% in the 2008 and 2007 auctions; the energy supply was negotiated at R$ 71.4/MWh in the case of Jirau, and R$ 78.9/MWh for the Santo Antonio plant.
Itaipu power plant
Built on the Paraná RiverParaná River
The Paraná River is a river in south Central South America, running through Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina for some . It is second in length only to the Amazon River among South American rivers. The name Paraná is an abbreviation of the phrase "para rehe onáva", which comes from the Tupi language...
dividing Brazil and Paraguay
Paraguay
Paraguay , officially the Republic of Paraguay , is a landlocked country in South America. It is bordered by Argentina to the south and southwest, Brazil to the east and northeast, and Bolivia to the northwest. Paraguay lies on both banks of the Paraguay River, which runs through the center of the...
, the Itaipu Dam is the world's largest hydroelectric dam. The river runs long the border of the two countries, and during the initial diplomatic talks of constructing the dam both countries were suffering from droughts. The original goal was to provide better management and utilization over water resources for the use of irrigation of crops. Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
was also later incorporated in some of the governmental planning and agreements because it is a directly affected, being down stream, by the regulation of the water on the river. If the dam were to completely open the water flow, areas as far south as Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
could potentially flood. Construction of the dam started in 1975, and the first generator was opened in 1983. Today, the dam provides over 75% of Paraguay's electric power needs, and meets nearly 25% of Brazil's electricity demands. It is estimated that 10,000 locals were displaced by the construction of the dam, and around 40,000 people were hired to help with the construction of the project. Many environmental concerns were overlooked when constructing the dam because the dam would produce such a large amount of energy with carbon free emissions, and no unwanted byproducts, such as with nuclear energy
Nuclear power
Nuclear power is the use of sustained nuclear fission to generate heat and electricity. Nuclear power plants provide about 6% of the world's energy and 13–14% of the world's electricity, with the U.S., France, and Japan together accounting for about 50% of nuclear generated electricity...
.
Hydroelectricity
Hydroelectric power plants produce over 90% of the electrical energy consumed in Brazil. They depend on river waters in adequate levels in their ponds to generate energy. Lack of rainfall, investments and increased consumption resulted in electrical energy rationalization, known as black out, in the years 2001 and 2002. The construction of new hydroelectric power plants means environmental impacts as large areas need to be flooded, altering the ecosystemEcosystem
An ecosystem is a biological environment consisting of all the organisms living in a particular area, as well as all the nonliving , physical components of the environment with which the organisms interact, such as air, soil, water and sunlight....
.
Trying not to use too much energy during peak hours, between 6 and 9 PM, is necessary to avoid the need to build new energy plants and transmission lines only to serve the demand in that timeframe. New dams mean very elevated social and environmental costs due to flooding land tracts and destroying habitats of animals, plants and entire communities that, many times, are not compensated (resettlement or indemnities). Large hydroelectric power plants flooding immense forest
Forest
A forest, also referred to as a wood or the woods, is an area with a high density of trees. As with cities, depending where you are in the world, what is considered a forest may vary significantly in size and have various classification according to how and what of the forest is composed...
areas emit large amounts of methane to the atmosphere. There is only sustainable development with energy coming from new renewable sources. Small hydroelectric plants can produce energy in a decentralized way with small environmental impact. Such an option can be implemented in several regions of the country making use of natural waterfalls. Many Brazilian farmers chose this.
Ethanol fuel
Brazil's ethanolEthanol
Ethanol, also called ethyl alcohol, pure alcohol, grain alcohol, or drinking alcohol, is a volatile, flammable, colorless liquid. It is a psychoactive drug and one of the oldest recreational drugs. Best known as the type of alcohol found in alcoholic beverages, it is also used in thermometers, as a...
program started in 1975, when soaring oil prices put a chokehold on the ecoom sugar cane was an obvious candidate, given Brazil's almost endless amount of arable land
Arable land
In geography and agriculture, arable land is land that can be used for growing crops. It includes all land under temporary crops , temporary meadows for mowing or pasture, land under market and kitchen gardens and land temporarily fallow...
and favourable climate.
Most cars on the road today in Brazil can run on blends of up to 25% ethanol, and motor vehicle manufacturers already produce vehicles designed to run on much higher ethanol blends. Most car makers in Brazil sell flexible-fuel cars, trucks, and minivans that can use gasoline
Gasoline
Gasoline , or petrol , is a toxic, translucent, petroleum-derived liquid that is primarily used as a fuel in internal combustion engines. It consists mostly of organic compounds obtained by the fractional distillation of petroleum, enhanced with a variety of additives. Some gasolines also contain...
and ethanol blends ranging from pure gasoline up to 100% ethanol (E100). In 2009, 90% of cars produced that year ran on sugarcane ethanol
Ethanol fuel in Brazil
Brazil is the world's second largest producer of ethanol fuel and the world's largest exporter. Together, Brazil and the United States lead the industrial production of ethanol fuel, accounting together for 87.8% of the world's production in 2010. In 2010 Brazil produced 26.2 billion litres Brazil...
.
Brazil is the second largest producer of ethanol in the world and is the largest exporter of the fuel. In 2008, Brazil produced 454,000 bbl/d of ethanol, up from 365,000 in 2007. All gasoline in Brazil contains ethanol, with blending levels varying from 20-25%. Over half of all cars in the country are of the flex-fuel variety, meaning that they can run on 100 percent ethanol or an ethanol-gasoline mixture. According to ANP, Brazil also produced about 20,000 bbl/d of biodiesel
Biodiesel
Biodiesel refers to a vegetable oil- or animal fat-based diesel fuel consisting of long-chain alkyl esters. Biodiesel is typically made by chemically reacting lipids with an alcohol....
in 2008, and the agency has enacted a three-percent blending requirement for domestic diesel sales.
The importance of ethanol in Brazil's domestic transportation fuels market will only increase in the future. According to Petrobrás
Petrobras
Petróleo Brasileiro or Petrobras is a semi-public Brazilian multinational energy corporation headquartered in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It is the largest company in Latin America by market capitalization and revenue, and the largest company headquartered in the Southern Hemisphere by market...
, ethanol accounts for more than 50 percent of current light vehicle fuel demand, and the company expects this to increase to over 80% by 2020. Because ethanol production continues to grow faster than domestic demand, Brazil has sought to increase ethanol exports. According to industry sources, Brazil's ethanol exports reached 86,000 bbl/d in 2008, with 13,000 bbl/d going to the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. Brazil is the largest ethanol exporter in the world, holding over 90% of the global export market.
Biomass
BiomassBiomass
Biomass, as a renewable energy source, is biological material from living, or recently living organisms. As an energy source, biomass can either be used directly, or converted into other energy products such as biofuel....
is a clean energy source used in Brazil. It reduces environmental pollution as it uses organic garbage, agricultural remains, wood
Wood
Wood is a hard, fibrous tissue found in many trees. It has been used for hundreds of thousands of years for both fuel and as a construction material. It is an organic material, a natural composite of cellulose fibers embedded in a matrix of lignin which resists compression...
shaving or vegetal oil. Refuse cane, with its high energetic value, has been used to produce electricity. More than 1 million people in the country works in the production of Biomass, and this energy represents 27% of Brazil's energetic matrix.
The recent interest in converting biomass to electricity comes not only from its potential as a low-cost, indigenous supply of power, but for its potential environmental and developmental benefits. For example, biomass may be a globally important mitigation option to reduce the rate of CO2 buildup by sequestering carbon and by displacing fossil fuels. Renewably-grown biomass contributes only a very small amount of carbon
Carbon
Carbon is the chemical element with symbol C and atomic number 6. As a member of group 14 on the periodic table, it is nonmetallic and tetravalent—making four electrons available to form covalent chemical bonds...
to the atmosphere
Atmosphere
An atmosphere is a layer of gases that may surround a material body of sufficient mass, and that is held in place by the gravity of the body. An atmosphere may be retained for a longer duration, if the gravity is high and the atmosphere's temperature is low...
. Locally, plantations can lessen soil erosion, provide a means to restore degraded lands, offset emissions and local impacts from fossil-fired power generation, and, perhaps, reduce demands on existing forests. In addition to the direct power and environmental benefits, biomass energy systems offer numerous other benefits, especially for developing countries, such as Brazil. Some of these benefits include the employment of underutilized labor and the production of co- and by-products, for example, fuelwood.
Nearly all of the experience with biomass for power generation is based on the use of waste
Waste
Waste is unwanted or useless materials. In biology, waste is any of the many unwanted substances or toxins that are expelled from living organisms, metabolic waste; such as urea, sweat or feces. Litter is waste which has been disposed of improperly...
and residue fuels (primarily wood/wood wastes and agricultural residues). The production of electric power from plantation
Plantation
A plantation is a long artificially established forest, farm or estate, where crops are grown for sale, often in distant markets rather than for local on-site consumption...
grown wood is an emerging technology with considerable promise. However, actual commercial use of plantation-grown fuels for power generation is limited to a few isolated experiences. Wood from plantations is not an inexpensive energy feedstock, and as long as worldwide prices of coal, oil and gas are relatively low, the establishment of plantations dedicated to supplying electric power or other higher forms of energy will occur only where financial subsidies or incentives exist or where other sources of energy are not available.
The biomass plantations are supplying energy on a commercial basis, such as in Brazil, the Philippines
Philippines
The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...
and Sweden
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
, it can be shown that a combination of government policies and/or high conventional energy prices have stimulated the use of short-rotation plantations for energy. Brazil used tax incentives beginning in the mid-1960s to initiate a reforestation program to provide for industrial wood energy and wood product needs. As a consequence of the Brazilian Forestry Code with its favourable tax incentives, the planted forest area in Brazil increased from 470,000 ha to 6.5 million ha by 1993. With the discontinuation of the tax incentives in 1988, plantation establishment in Brazil has slowed although the commercial feasibility of using eucalyptus
Eucalyptus
Eucalyptus is a diverse genus of flowering trees in the myrtle family, Myrtaceae. Members of the genus dominate the tree flora of Australia...
for energy and other products has been clearly demonstrated.
See also
- Energy policy of BrazilEnergy policy of BrazilBrazil is the 10th largest energy consumer in the world and the largest in South America. At the same time, it is an important oil and gas producer in the region and the world's second largest ethanol fuel producer....
- Nuclear power in Brazil