Ethanol consumption set to rise as govt looks to increase rate of fuel blending

Food secretary Sudhanshu Pandey on Friday said the country’s fuel ethanol consumption is set to rise and the government is targeting the implementation of motor fuel blending at the rate of E20 (20:80 ethanol: gasoline) by the year 2024. Motor fuel blending of 20% will become mandatory from 2025, he said.

While delivering the inaugural addressing an event organised by the Indian Sugar Mills Association (Isma), he said that the government has come out with regulations for the automobile sector according to which, E10 (10:90 ethanol: gasoline) has already been allowed. By 2025, the 20% fuel blending target shall be achieved by using 17 million tonne of foodgrains, which is also surplus. This move will help farmers, industry and the environment. “Currently the country has 90 million tonne of foodstock in public stock holding. Many countries thought that stock is burdening the market. But during the Covid-19 pandemic, almost 60 million tonne of foodgrains were distributed free of cost to 800 million people. This helped the country fight Covid-19 pandemic in an effective way. Now India will be moving towards E20 target by using about 17 million tonne of foodgrains for ethanol production,” he said.