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Biofuels are derived from renewable biomass that can partially or completely replace petroleum-derived fuels. The two most used biofuels in Brazil are ethanol, extracted from sugar cane, and biodiesel, made from vegetable oils and/or animal fat, added to diesel in varying amounts.
However, due to the pandemic, the government was forced to take some maneuvers to hold prices, mainly in the gasoline, postponing the substitution of biofuel.
With the gasoline tax cut, fuel consumption ethanol retreated, making its sales the lowest in the last five years. Biodiesel sales also plummeted due to the reduction of mandatory blending in diesel, which retreated to levels of almost three years.
As a result, we imported more fuel, according to Luiz Augusto Horta, former ANP director, it was a wrong decision that only benefited gasoline and diesel.
Even with the sales records in liquid fuels, which was 100,8 billion liters in the first 10 months of 2022, breaking a record, it was not enough to leverage the sale of biodiesel, since the government has been keeping the mixture at 10% to contain the high escalation of prices due to international oil prices.
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In the first 7 months of the year, data available from Oil National Agency, Gas and Biofuel (ANP) biodiesel sales in the country totaled 3,6 billion liters, the lowest volume since 3,3's 2019 billion liters, when the mixture was 11%. Because of this, today biodiesel is equivalent to imported diesel, making clear the devaluation of the national product, which in addition to being a renewable energy, is beneficial to the environment.
In the case of ethanol, the problems were even greater, since the price of gasoline was reduced. The drop was 12,9 billion liters between January and October of that year. It is the lowest value since 2017, according to ANP data. Gasoline had the best sales volume since that year with 34,8 billion liters.
Brazilian ethanol: biofuel is essential for the future of mobility
According to UNICA (União da Indústria de Cana-de-Açúcar), which in addition to the loss of competitiveness in the second half of the year, the drop in the crop in 2021 also hurt sales that year, even with production accelerating in the second half of 2022, fight is still unfair, since taxes on gasoline were cut.
The replacement of renewable fuels, due to fossils having a direct impact on the Brazilian economic balance, with less biodiesel and the increase in demand, the sale of imported diesel soars in the first half, reaching 7 billion liters, up 31% compared to 2019, before the pandemic .
Those responsible for the transition between governments still have no definition on the subject, but the idea is to encourage the use of biofuel.
