Perspective of the Sugarcane Industry in Brazil

Abstract

The sugarcane industry in Brazil is experiencing a rapid shift towards creating the grounds for a green and sustainable biorefinary industry. After 30 years of ProAlcool, the federal government program that boosted Brazil’s sugarcane industry by creating a mandate to blend ethanol with gasoline, flex fuel engines now dominate Brazil’s automobile industry. Currently, bioethanol replaces around 30% of the gasoline consumed in the country and its demand is projected to more that double in the next 10 years. On another front, the sugarcane genomics program created by FAPESP in the late 1990s paved the way for the establishment of innovative biotechnology startup companies that attracted the attention of the largest agro-biotechnology sector companies of the world. Almost all of these companies now have their sugarcane research centers surrounding the city of Campinas, São Paulo. In addition, innovative synthetic biology companies are developing technologies to produce diesel, jet fuel and other high value molecules using sugarcane juice as a carbon source. The sugarcane industry also teamed with petrochemical companies and already established operating plants to produce bioplastics. Innovations have also occurred in the field of co-generation of electricity from sugarcane bagasse. Currently sugarcane supplies 4% of the electricity needs of the country. Collectively, these innovations suggest that Brazil’s sugarcane industry could supply over 30% of the country energy needs by 2021 and a significant fraction of new bioproducts produced by its nascent biorefinary plants.