Ethiopia’s sugar Corporation in conjunction with Germany’s Eugen Schmitt Company will construct a US$ 51m ethanol plant in the country.
The plant which will be developed at Wonji Shoa Sugar Factory will be put up in phases. Construction of the first phase will commence in October and construction of the second phase will start next year; this is according to Gashaw Aychiluhim, corporate communications director of the Sugar Corporation.
Eugen Schmitt Company from Germany will have 83pc of the share, while the Ethiopian government and the three other shareholders will take the remaining 14pc and three percent shares, respectively.
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Production capacity of the ethanol plant
Once the plant is operational, it will have the capacity of producing 60,000lt of ethanol per day using molasses. This is a by-product of sugar which Wonji Shoa Sugar Factory discharges.
Finchaa and Metehara are the two sugar factories in Ethiopia that are currently producing ethanol from molasses. The plant will become the third mill in the country producing ethanol from molasses.
About the sugar factories
The factory started production in 1998 and till July, 2013 the average annual production capacity of Finchaa Sugar Factory was 110,000 tons of sugar while it had the capacity of producing 8,000 meter cube ethanol. Till the last months of 2010 it had been the only factory in the country that produces ethanol.
On the other hand, through an expansion project conducted at Metehara sugar factory, it came up with an ethanol producing plant by the end of 2010. Currently the factory’s ethanol plant has a capacity of producing 12,500 Meter Cube ethanol a year. It also generates 9 Mega Watt electric power and satisfy its own power demand by itself.
