Sugarcane Bioenergy as Primary Energy Source

Bioenergy has become Brazil's fastest growing renewable energy source and is already generating more power than all non-oil fossil fuel sources combined. As a whole, the country now generates 46.4% of its energy from renewables. This compares very favorably with the primary energy mix of OECD countries, where renewables account for a mere 5.2%.

Brazil is known for its large hydropower infrastructures, with more than 600 dams built on the country's many rivers. The largest dam, the Itaipu, has an installed capacity of 14GW and provides some 20% of Brazil's electricity needs. However, erratic rainfall patterns over the past few years, combined with the fact that almost all large rivers have been dammed, have limited the prospects for new large hydroelectric power projects.

In contrast, growing demand for efficient and competitive biofuels has resulted in an ambitious vision to focus the future of electricity generation in Brazil more on biomass. Sugarcane ethanol production yields a very large mass of waste, called bagasse, which is used to (co-)generate electricity. An initial step in the EPE's bio-electricity vision was the recent auction of 7.8GW of biopower: more than 118 sugarcane factories capable of generating excess green electricity ready to be fed into the national grid, registered to participate in the auction.

According to the National Energy Evaluation, the current situation looks as follows: ethanol and pulp accounted for 16% of Brazil’s total energy output in 2007, up from 14.5% the previous year. Hydroelectric power remained essentially stable at 14.7%, down 0.1 percentage points from 2006. Oil and derivatives retained the top spot with 36.7% of output, down from the 2006 level of 37.8%. Bioenergy has thus become Brazil's second largest primary energy source:
Overall, the Brazilian demand for all forms of energy grew 5.9% in 2007, totaling 239.4 million tonnes of oil equivalent (toe). The rate of growth for energy demand was greater than the growth in the Brazilian economy (5.4%).

Brazil's sustainable energy mix might hold the future for many African countries. Not less than 25 countries there have a very large land and agroecological resource base that allows for the production of highly efficient energy crops, like sugarcane or sorghum.

With oil and coal prices at record highs, and other, less-cost effective renewables like wind or solar not being capable of providing reliable baseloads, biomass may become the most important form of primary energy on the African continent.

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