Bioethanol producers slapped fees, charges

Sugar regulators have imposed fees and charges on bioethanol producers that use sugar-based inputs, citing requirements in the Biofuels Act enacted in 2006.

The Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) last week issued Sugar Order No. 5, which states that the producers themselves “unanimously agreed”  in a meeting last November to pay such fees.

Thus, bioethanol makers who use as inputs sugar, sugar syrup, sugarcane, molasses and other products and by-products of sugarcane will pay 5 centavos a liter of fuel produced as “monitoring fee.”

The monitoring fees collected will form part of the SRA’s corporate fund.

Also, producers who use the same inputs will pay 10 centavos per liter of output as lien for bioethanol research, development and extension (BRDE).

The SRA said it would set aside the BRDE lien as “a trust account specifically for the purpose of funding research, development and extension projects of the bioethanol fuel industry that shall be endorsed by the Ethanol Producers Association of the Philippines.”

Also, nonpayment of the fee and the lien will be subject to suspension or revocation of the producer’s registration with the SRA.

Last December, SRA Administrator Ma. Regina Martin said domestic capacity to produce bioethanol was expected to increase by 100 million liters yearly to total at 322 million liters.

“(The beefed up volume represents) around 80 percent of the E10 requirement (for the Philippines),” Martin said.

She meant that the expanded capacity could support four-fifths of the volume needed to ensure that gasoline sold within the country contains the mandatory 10 percent ethanol.

Some of the bioethanol producers already in the market are Green Future Innovations in Isabela province (with a capacity of 54 million liters) and Leyte Agri in Leyte (9 million liters) as well as San Carlos Bioenergy (40 million liters) and Roxol Bioenergy (30 million liters)—both in Negros Occidental.