[Jan] Ethanol production in India

Question 1

Context?

Answer 1

The MoEFCC announced that mills would not require separate environmental clearance to produce additional ethanol from B-heavy molasses.

Question 2

What are ethanol and molasses?

Answer 2

• Ethanol, or ethyl alcohol, is a liquid that has several uses.
• At 95% purity, it is called rectified spirit and is used as the intoxicating ingredient in alcoholic beverages. At 99%-plus purity, ethanol is used for blending with petrol.
• Both products are made from molasses, a byproduct of sugar manufacturing.

Question 3

How much ethanol from cane?

Answer 3

Thus, from one tonne of cane, mills can produce 115 kg of sugar (at 11.5% recovery) and 45 kg of molasses (18 kg TFS) that gives 10.8 litres of ethanol.

Question 4

Why more ethanol is getting produced?

Answer 4

government mandating 10% blending of petrol with ethanol.

Question 5

objective of National Policy on Biofuels (NBP) -2018 under the Ethanol Blended Petrol (EBP) Programme?

Answer 5

blending 20% ethanol in petrol by 2030.

Question 6

Govn efforts

Answer 6

• allowed production of ethanol from sugarcane and food grain based raw-materials.
• fixed price of ethanol from sugarcane based raw-materials & other feedstocks
• notified interest subvention schemes (i.e. short term credit at subsidised interest rate.) for setting up of molasses and grain based new distilleries or expansion of existing distilleries.

Question 7

Ethanol

Answer 7

• produced from sugarcane, maize, wheat i.e. high starch content things
• As the ethanol molecule contains oxygen, it allows the engine to more completely combust the fuel, resulting in fewer emissions and thereby reducing the occurrence of environmental pollution.
• Since ethanol is produced from plants that harness the power of the sun, ethanol is also considered as renewable fuel.