How Royal Dutch Shell Intends To Boost Ethanol Production In Brazil

Bidness Etc looks at the progress Shell is making in the joint-venture with with Cosan Limited to boost ethanol production in Brazil over the next ten years

By: MICHEAL KAUFMAN
Published: Dec 30, 2014 at 7:19 am EST

The joint-venture between Royal Dutch Shell plc (ADR) (NYSE:RDS.A) and Cosan Limited(USA) (NYSE:CZZ), called Raizen, plans to spend nearly $1 billion on building ethanol production facilities to increase its biofuel output by 50%, according to the Financial Times (FT).

Cosan Limited intends to build eight ethanol plants over the next ten years, for an estimated cost of $930 million (2.5 billion reais). The plants will produce cellulosic ethanol fuel using sugarcane waste as its primary raw material, the most efficient source of biofuel. The first of eight plants was completed last week, and has an annual capacity of 40 million liters. After the completion of all plants, the company expects biofuel output to increase 50%. read more

By Eduard Gismatullin – Nov 13, 2013 10:38 AM GMT

The following are excerpts from an interview with Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSA) Chief Executive Officer Peter Voser at the company’s headquarters in The Hague.

Voser, who has headed Europe’s largest oil and gas producer since 2009, steps down at the end of the year, 31 years after first joining the company.

On Shell and renewable energy:

“It would be stupid from the oil and gas industry to say that renewables will not play a major role in the energy system of the next few decades. read more

EBR Staff Writer: 08 July 2013

European oil giants BP and Royal Dutch Shell are deferring their investments in bio-fuel projects by holding a consolidated investment of about $57m during the first quarter of 2013.

Industry sources claim that the current quarter witnessed the lowest investment for bio-fuel production since 2006.

FULL ARTICLE

UK fraud authorities are “urgently reviewing” whether to launch an investigation into companies that may have rigged the oil market and driven up petrol costs for millions of drivers.

By Rowena Mason and Christopher Hope: 7:06PM BST 16 May 2013

The Serious Fraud Office said it is considering an inquiry, after European Commission officials raided the London offices of BP and Shell. The companies, along with a Norwegian oil giant, Statoil, are suspected of having “colluded in reporting distorted prices to manipulate the published prices for a number of oil and biofuel products”.

It comes the day after David Cameron said he wanted to see prosecutions with the “full force of the law” if the allegations are proven. read more

By 2023, a Changed World in Energy

By CLIFFORD KRAUSS: A version of this article appeared in print on April 25, 2013, on page F1 of the New York edition

HOUSTON

IF you could close your eyes for just a moment like Rip Van Winkle, and blink them open in 2023, you might see a very different energy world.

Electric cars may be popular. Solar energy could be cheap enough that millions of households and businesses deploy solar panels to generate their power needs. Fossil fuels will probably still dominate, but most trucks and many trains could run on natural gas rather than more polluting diesel. And the United States could be a major oil exporter.

None of this is implausible. Consider the change over the last 10 years. Back in 2003, American natural gas fields were thought to be drying up and energy entrepreneurs were beginning to invest in hugely expensive terminals to import gas, not export it. American oil production continued to plummet. read more

Earlier this year, Raizen, a biofuels company set up by Shell and COSAN scrapped controversial plans to source sugarcane from land stolen from the Guarani after a sustained campaign by the Indians and Survival.

A US food giant has been implicated in a sugarcane scandal in Brazil that has kept an entire indigenous community off its land, polluted streams and inflicted illness and death on Guarani Indians.

Headquartered in the US, global grain trader Bunge is deeply involved in Brazil’s burgeoning biofuels market, and sources sugarcane from farmers who have taken over the ancestral land of the Guarani.

A community of 225 Guarani in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, whose land was taken from them to make way for the plantations, says the invasion of sugarcane, associated machinery and pesticides has ruined their lives over the past four years. read more

Engineering begins on Iogen-based cellulosic plant in Brazil

By Susanne Retka Schill | October 17, 2012

Ottawa-based Iogen Energy Corp. announced an initial investment by Raízen Group to develop a commercial cellulosic ethanol project in Brazil. Raízen, a joint venture between Royal Dutch Shell and Cosan SA is the world’s largest producer of sugarcane ethanol. Iogen Energy, a joint venture with Shell and Iogen Corp., operates a demonstration facility in Ottawa where it has produced over 2 million liters (560,000 gallons) of cellulosic ethanol as it refined its process since 2004. read more

Codexis, Shell redefine relationship; Codexis gains global rights; will lay off 133 staff; adopts anti-takeover measures; what does it mean for Shell, Raizen, Iogen, Codexis and Dyadic? What does it say about strategic investors in advanced biofuels?

13 June 2012

A biofuels company set up by Shell in Brazil has scrapped controversial plans to source sugar cane from land stolen from an indigenous tribe after a vociferous campaign by the Indians and Survival International.

The company, Raizen, was established in 2010 as a joint venture of Shell and Brazilian ethanol giant Cosan to produce biofuel from sugar cane.

But some of its sugar cane is grown on land claimed by the Guarani tribe, one of the most persecuted and impoverished in South America. Their leaders are regularly killed by gunmen acting for the sugar cane growers and cattle ranchers who have taken over almost all their land. read more

By Ken Wells – May 10, 2012 5:01 AM GMT+0100

BP Plc (BP/) has invested $7 billion in alternative energy since 2005. Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) is spending $600 million on a 10-year effort to turn algae into oil. And Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSA) has been buying up sugar cane mills, plantations and refineries to make ethanol in Brazil.

In the U.S., Shell already produces small lots of so-called drop-in biofuels–engine-ready products that can replace gasoline from a plant in Houston that uses sugar beets and crop waste. read more

December 15, 2011

The U.K.’s advertising watchdog has ruled in favor of oil giant Shell over claims it made in a magazine advert that its biofuels reduced CO2 emissions.

Nonprofit ActionAid UK had challenged that the advert, which called the fuels “one of the most effective ways of reducing CO2 from cars and trucks today,” was misleading. ActionAid said that evidence showed that biofuels did not reduce CO2 emissions from vehicles when the full life-cycle of the fuel was taken into account. read more

BUSINESS CHINA

11 Oct 2011

5 Questions with Shell CEO Peter Voser

Q. At SIEW 2011, you will be speaking on the future of energy. Can you provide us with a sneak preview on where you see the future of energy?

A: The global energy system is in the early stages of a historic transformation. Customer demand for secure and affordable energy is growing, propelled by a rising global population and strong economic growth, particularly in the developing countries. Traditional energy supplies are becoming politically and technically more difficult to reach. At the same time, environmental stresses linked to meeting energy demand are increasing; rising CO2 emissions and pressure on natural resources, such as water. read more

In a 2009 report on Brazil, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous people, mister James Anaya, wrote that Mato Grosso do Sul “has the highest rate of indigenous children’s death due to precarious conditions of health and access to water and food, related to lack of lands.”

From pages 22, 23 & 24 of “Royal Dutch Shell and its sustainability troubles” – Background report to the Erratum of Shell’s Annual Report 2010

The report is made on behalf of Milieudefensie (Friends of the Earth Netherlands)
Author: Albert ten Kate: May 2011.

Joint venture with Brazil’s largest sugar and ethanol producer

On 25 August 2010, Royal Dutch Shell and the Brazilian sugar and ethanol producer Cosan S.A. have signed binding agreements to form a joint venture in Brazil. The definite formation of the joint venture is expected to occur in the first half of 2011. The name of the joint venture will be Rai?zen. “Due to the size of its operations, Rai?zen will help sugarcane ethanol, a sustainable, clean and renewable source of energy, to consolidate itself worldwide and strengthen Brazil‘s position in the international biofuels trading business,” stated its appointed Chief Executive Officer, Vasco Dias. read more

SEPTEMBER 9, 2011

LONDON (Dow Jones)–Royal Dutch Shell PLC (RDSA.LN), Friday confirmed that it has made solid progress in starting up three world-class oil & gas projects in 2011, which at peak will add some 400,000 barrels oil equivalent, and is on track to deliver its strategic targets for 50-80% growth in cash flow from operations from 2009 to 2012.

MAIN FACTS:

-Shell’s three-year strategic plan, outlined in 2010, is building the foundations for profitable growth for shareholders in the future. read more

Survival’s Director, Stephen Corry, said today, ‘It’s a sad irony that people buy Shell’s ethanol as an ‘ethical’ alternative to fossil fuels: there’s certainly nothing ethical about its horrendous treatment of the Guarani.

Guarani man. Shell is using sugarcane planted on Guarani land. © F. Watson/Survival

Indians of the Guarani tribe in Brazil have demanded that energy giant Shell stop using their ancestral land for ethanol production.

Ambrosio Vilhalva, a Guarani man from one of the communities affected, told Survival, ‘Shell must leave our land… the companies must stop using indigenous land. We want justice, we want our land to be mapped out and protected for us’.

Shell is united with Brazilian ethanol company Cosan, in a joint venture company called Raizen. Some of Raizen’s ethanol, sold as a biofuel, is produced from sugarcane grown on the Guarani’s ancestral land. read more

Jason Alden/Bloomberg: A Shell station in London, U.K. Shell posted adjusted earnings of $6.6 billion, matching the mean estimate of nine analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.

By Eduard Gismatullin – Jul 28, 2011 8:47 AM GMT+0100

Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSA), Europe’s biggest oil company, said second-quarter earnings almost doubled on higher oil prices and project startups in Qatar and Canada.

Net income rose to $8.66 billion from $4.39 billion a year earlier, The Hague-based Shell said today in a statement. Excluding one-time items and inventory changes, profit matched analyst estimates. read more