UP to augment ethanol production from agro waste

Virendra Singh Rawat

Lucknow / Jan 6, 2021

To provide an additional and lucrative avenue of farm income to the farmers, the Uttar Pradesh government is preparing a roadmap for producing ethanol from agricultural waste.

UP is the country’s top ethanol producer with installed capacity of more than 1.4 billion litres (BL) per annum, mainly established by the 119 government and private sugar mills even as more ethanol facilities are in the pipeline for augmenting the fuel blending programme.

According to sources, the state has tasked UP additional chief secretary, sugarcane and sugar industry, Sanjay Bhoosreddy to prepare a roadmap for producing ethanol from agro waste and residue, such as paddy straw, cotton stalks, wooden hay, rotten potato, rotten wheat and rice etc apart from the sugar byproducts.

He will hold consultations with the senior officials of the food processing, agro marketing and Food Corporation of India (FCI) to draft the blueprint.

Under the central biofuel policy announced by the petroleum and natural gas ministry, a range of agricultural and organic products have been identified as raw material for the production of ethanol and biodiesel.

Meanwhile, between December 2019 and November 2020, the public sector oil marketing companies (OMCs) had signed supply contracts worth 1.95 BL with the distilleries/ethanol manufacturers in India. Of this, supply contracts totalling 55 per cent or 1.06 were firmed up with the UP based production facilities, mostly captive distilleries of sugar mills.

Besides, UP is also the leader in ethanol blending programme by achieving about 9.6 per cent blending percentage against the federal target of 10 per cent. The Centre allows blending of ethanol with the petroleum products for paring the oil import bill and conserving environment.

Apart from the OMCs, the ethanol is also required by the pharmaceutical and chemical manufacturers, which provides a readymade market for it.

The Yogi Adityanath government is looking to capitalise on this policy for creating new job opportunities and increasing the rural incomes. Interestingly, this has become even more relevant in the present context of the raging farmers’ stir over new farm laws and seeking rural income guarantee.