Mar 17, 2008 — Ethanol Statistics

DORDRECHT, The Netherlands, March 17, 2008 (press release) — The worldwide production of cellulosic ethanol will amount to at least 16.5 billion gallons in 2020, if the targets set in the United States, China, Europe, Japan and Brazil are achieved.

Based on currently proposed and signed legislation, the United States would account for over 63.9% of that market, while the EU and China would account for 10.4 and 11.5% respectively. Although Brazil doesn’t have any official legislation on cellulosic ethanol, it is included based on UNICA estimations of market penetration, which amount to around 2.1 billion gallons (12.9%) in 2020. Japan would account for only 1.3% based on currently proposed legislation.

It is important to note that some of the leading organizations in the industry expect significant market penetration beyond currently approved and proposed legislation. Based on complex models for market penetration, Syngenta and McKinsey project a global market for cellulosic ethanol of 20- 25 and 30-35 billion gallons respectively. In its basic scenario Syngenta presumes that cellulosic ethanol will gain momentum as of 2015, and the entire biofuels market to grow at 14% per annum. In its optimistic scenario, it assumes an early technology breakthrough in cellulosic ethanol, resulting in a global market of 45 billion gallons….