Vietnam plans five biofuel plants

Vietnam plans to complete five sugarcane biofuel plants by 2010, Reuters reports. The government hopes these plants will meet a tiny part of domestic demand for increasingly expensive petrol and diesel.
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The plants would meet 0.4% of national demand for fuel by producing a combined 100,000 tonnes of ethanol 5% gasoline (E5) and 50,000 tonnes of biodiesel 5% (B5) per year, deputy minister of Science and Technology, Nguyen Van Lang said.

 

The first plant commences operation next year in the northern province of Phu Tho with an annual capacity of 100 million litres of ethanol. Other plants include the 40-million-litre-per-year ethanol factory by Saigon Biofuel Company and the Dung Quat ethanol plant by PV Oil.

 

Hanoi endorsed a project last year to produce 250,000 tonnes of ethanol per year by 2015 to meet 1% of the country’s petrol demand as it sought to cope with high energy costs.

 

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