Env. panel meet on Jan 6 to approve ethanol plants

The expert appraisal committee of the ministry of environment, forest and climate change (MoEFCC) will consider a dozen applications on January 6-7 from companies to set up grain-based ethanol distillery units across India.

The interest to set up fresh units for ethanol production comes at a time when the government is going all out to promote ethanol production from various feed stocks to meet the blending targets of ethanol with petrol and reduce dependence on imported fossil fuels.

Among the applicants, Goyal Distillery, Gulshan Polyols and Dhanuka Biotech will seek environment clearances to set up grain-based ethanol plants of 250 kilo litre per day (KLPD) capacity each in Haryana, Assam and Madhya Pradesh respectively. The proposed ethanol plants of Shreebalaji Biosolutions (120 KLPD capacity), Smprimal Process (100 KLPD), and Oasis Distilleries (125 KPLD) are all meant to come up in Madhya Pradesh. Modi Biotech and Kalindi Ispat have applied for permission to establish grain based ethanol plants in Chhattisgarh. Coastal Biotech seeks permission to set up one in Odisha.

Three firms have approached the appraisal committee to reconsider their applications to establish grain-base fuel ethanol units. Mahakaushal Distillery plans one in Madhya Pradesh, Brajendra Kumar Builders has proposed a plant in Bihar and Hayati Beverages seeks permission for a grain based ethanol project in Chhattisgarh.

Exactly a year ago, the government had announced an interest subvention scheme to encourage greenfield as well as capacity enhancement of distilleries for producing ethanol from feed stocks such as rice, wheat, barley, corn, sugarcane, sugar beet etc. or converting molasses-based distilleries to dual feedstock. The objective is to reduce dependence on imported fossil fuel through 10% blending of fuel grade ethanol with petrol by 2022 and 20% blending by 2030.