Who needs petrol when cars run on sugar cane?
IF PRESIDENT Bush needs an example of how ethanol can help to reduce dependence on oil imports, he need look no further than Brazil. What Saudi Arabia is to crude oil, Brazil is to ethanol — the environmentally friendly, renewable fuel of which it is the largest producer. Brazil makes the fuel by fermenting and distilling its sugar cane crop, the biggest in the world, and then using the liquid to fuel a rapidly increasing proportion of its transport fleet. Seven out of ten of all new cars sold in Brazil are now “flex-fuel” — owners can fill them with either ethanol or petrol. Computer sensors inside the engine then decide what will be the best mix of whatever is in the tank for optimum performance. Finding ethanol is not a problem either — nearly all petrol stations have pumps selling pure ethanol, while all regular petrol sold at the pumps is a mix called “gasohol”, a blend that contains up to 25 per cent ethanol. Ethanol produces a cleaner burn than petrol, resulting in less pollutio
