Largest biodiesel plant in Portugal will use grains from Brazil

Refinery will start to operating in 2010. Main raw materials are soybean and sunflower.

A Portuguese consortium is preparing to build the largest biodiesel plant in the country, which will operate with 90% of its raw material – mainly soybean and sunflower – from Brazil, Angola and Mozambique.

The refinery should start operating in 2010 and has an annual capacity of 250k tons, according to a shareholder. The rest of the raw material will come from Portugal, and can be soybean, rapeseed and palm.

Operation

The consortium, known as GreenCyber is owned by Hagen construction, of individual investors and the bank EFISA.

The refinery will be built at the port of Sines, south of Portugal, where the biodiesel can be exported and with easy access to roads and railways that connect the country to Spain.

The refinery will try to take advantage of the government’s objective to reduce dependence on oil, in addition to reach the target of a mixture of 10% in diesel by 2010, or 600k tons per year.

Extension

Acording to the investor Pedro Sampaio Nunes, the refinery could easily expand the capacity.  “Our facility allows us to easily triple our capacity, which I believe will happen in the next 10 years,” he said.

Portugal currently has four refineries to produce biodiesel, producing a total of 500k tons per year.