Ethanol production in Brazil's key center-south region fell 9.6% in the first half of September compared to the last half of August, but rose 3.9% year on year, data released by trade group UNICA showed Tuesday.
Total ethanol output for the 15 day-period was 1.88 billion liters, compared to 2.08 billion liters in late August, and 1.81 billion liters during the 2012-2013 harvest.
Of the 1.88 billion liters produced, 1.02 billion liters were hydrous ethanol, and 865 million liters were anhydrous ethanol.
Accumulated ethanol production so far this harvest, through September 15, is 17.24 billion liters, showing a 25.9% increase on the same date during last year's harvest. Of the accumulated 17.24 billion liters so far produced, 9.88 billion liters have been hydrous ethanol, an increase of 18.51% compared to last year. Meanwhile, production of anhydrous ethanol has increased 37.47% on last year's harvest to reach 7.36 billion liters.
A decision by the government to increase the proportion of anhydrous ethanol mixed in with gasoline from 20% to 25%, taken in May, has significantly boosted demand for the fuel.
This year's harvest through September 15 has seen mills allocating an average of 55.03% of their sugarcane to ethanol production, reflecting greater demand for the fuel, and lower worldwide prices for sugar. At this point during the 2012-2013 harvest, only 50.5% of sugarcane had been directed to ethanol output.
During the first two weeks of September, 50.86% of sugarcane has been directed to ethanol production, with the remaining 49.14% made into sugar.
Unica's Technical Director Antonio de Padua Rodrigues said in a statement "there was a small increase in the proportion of sugarcane allocated for the production of sugar this 15 days, compared with the previous 15 days, which recorded 48.61% directed to sugar, but we are still far short of the values seen in the last harvest."
Sugar production during the first 15 days of September was down 5.56% on the same period last year. However, accumulated sugar production during the harvest so far was still up 5.15% compared to last year's harvest.
The total quantity of sugarcane processed from September 1 through 15 was 42.84 million tons, an increase of 2.09% compared to the same 15 days last year, but falling 11.7% from the 48.54 million tons processed in the prior 15 days.
So far this harvest an accumulated 406.3 million tons of sugarcane has been processed by mills in the center-south, where some 90% of Brazil's cane is grown, up 16.21% on the quantity that had been crushed at this point during the 2012-2013 harvest. However, Unica noted in a statement that this amount remains below the 417.65 million tons recorded at the same point during the 2010-2011 season, which saw 556.95 million tons of cane processed by harvest-end.
Padua Rodrigues noted that some units performed scheduled maintenance during September, slowing the daily grind level.
ETHANOL SALES
In the first half of September, ethanol sales by center-south mills totaled 1.02 billion liters, rising from the 971.7 million liters sold during the same period of 2012. Of this volume, 117.4 million liters were exported, and 901.2 million liters were sold on the domestic market.
On the domestic market from September 1 through 15, sales of anhydrous ethanol totaled 354.6 million liters, compared to 277.9 million liters recorded in the same half last year, likely rising largely due to the gasoline mixture increase. Domestic sales of hydrous ethanol reached 546.53 million liters, increasing 13.40 % over the same period of 2012.
From April 1 through September 15, ethanol sales reached 12.02 billion liters, surging 24% from the 9.72 billion liters sold during the same period last year. Exports accounted for 1.74 billion liters of this volume, while domestic sales rose 26.2% to a total of 10.28 billion liters.
"Ethanol sales in the domestic market remained heated in the first half of September," said Padua Rodrigues, noting that this was the case even though the cane harvest in the Northeast has begun, meaning the region will need to "import" less ethanol from the center-south region.
