Imperative 21: 2nd vision: Mega co-ops' joint venture production of ethanol, sweeteners and ethanol-fueled vehicles
South American production of ethanol from sugarcane is said to garner a 50% gross profit margin. Mega co-ops may raise the margin to 70% or so by replacing sugar cane with sweet sorghum as feedstock. Sugarcane is harvested once a year versus sweet sorghum at 2.5 times a year. Furthermore, irrigation and cultivation costs for sweet sorghum are just a third that of sugarcane, and sweet sorghum juice is sweeter than sugarcane juice. Sweet sorghum juice may also be converted into bottled syrup or vinegar for sale to retail stores, homes and food factories. Sweet sorghum grains may be used for production of stevia-sweetened fruity cookies sprinkled with herbal anti-oxidant powders as preventives versus diabetes, hypertension and ageing. Sweet sorghum leaves and stalks are tasty fodder for cattle, goats and sheep. Thru strip cropping and alternate planting and harvest of farm plots, sorghum harvests can be perpetual (the Philippines has year-round sun), which means endless production of ethanol and the other indicated products.
For startup ethanol distillation, fifty mega co-ops may contribute P10 million each, several 1st World CSR companies may invest $4 million, and the joint venture may sell $27 million in ten-year bonds to 1st World Green Funds and Aid agencies. The combined capital and loans should finance 50 imported juicing mills for each of the 50 investing co-ops as sweet sorghum growers, one central ethanol distillery, and factories for manufacturing bottled sweet sorghum syrup and vinegar, packaged cookies, and livestock feed pellets in sacks for export. Sorghum planting may be made in upland strip plots that surround reforested 'islands' of 30-50 hectares each. The sorghum plots will double as fire breaks while the forest 'islands' will double as wind breaks, thereby minimizing fire or typhoon damage if any. Each farm's strip plots may total 200-300 hectares in area to guarantee volume production for the distillery and factories.
Ethanol marketing may be done by co-op clusters' central marketing companies. Concurrent with start of ethanol production, mega co-op joint venture companies must set up companies that convert local vehicles from diesel and gasoline to ethanol-gasoline fueled engines at 85% ethanol (E85). Once build-operate-transfer companies have set up mini hydropower chains and geothermal plants, the same joint ventures may later manufacture brand new E85-fueled vehicles using imported all-electric steel mills and parts-making equipment. Some 2 billion tons of local iron ore and magnetite sand plus over 100 million tons of local nickel and chromite deposits should ensure low-cost raw material supply for the metal works, which means low-priced E85 vehicles. Said vehicles may be sold locally and tropics-wide to replace gasoline and diesel-fueled transports, thus help reduce more CO2 emissions to the atmosphere. Widespread use of E85 vehicles will greatly reduce high prices of all local goods and services because current transport costs incident to gasoline and diesel use are exceedingly high (almost triple future ethanol prices), with signs of more price increases for current fuels over the horizon.
Prospective joint venture engine conversion and vehicle manufacturing partners may be auto companies in Brazil, Italy, Germany, USA and Japan who all currently fabricate and sell flex-fuel vehicles (10% to 100% ethanol) at combined million-level units per year. The ultimate target: majority of 3rd World vehicles ethanol-fueled, thereby reducing current transport costs by 70% or so. Petrochemical imports should likewise be reduced to bare minimum, and CO2 transport emissions down by 50-70%. 15% gasoline in E85 fuel is equivalent to premium gasoline. Ethanol may also be used tropics-wide to replace firewood and LPG as cooking fuels for cost reduction, saving of forests and global cooling purposes.
Some of the strip plots previously described should be planted to stevia, a small leafy plant whose leaves when dried and powdered may be packed as diabetes-preventive sweetener which is 300 times sweeter than sugar. Stevia may be exported to expatriate Filipinos' sideline marketing companies for sale to wholesalers, retailers, hospitals and food factories, and be a standard retailing product in ASEAN Festival malls. Stevia processing and sales may be made thru joint ventures between mega co-ops and local producers that already export the product at limited quantities.
What should be the carbon mitigation and social effects? Applied tropics-wide, ethanol production will prevent further million-ton CO2 emissions each year from the tropics. Ethanol-powered transports will greatly reduce the masses' food costs, since transport costs form major shares in current food mark-ups in the 3rd World tropics. Said transports will also enable farmgate prices to rise due to higher demand incident to greatly enhanced transport accessibility. In the Philippines, current farmgate prices can be as low as 10% of urban market retailing prices due to ultra-expensive petrochemical fuels used by transports. Mega co-op and employee groups' farms equipped with E85 cargo trucks will enable such producers to engage in direct retailing of harvests in city markets, which means high profit margins for producers yet low prices for consumers. Finally, endless production of indicated products will give regular and high-rate salaries to millions of new Elementary-level Philippine rural employees, enabling them to afford College education for job promotion, mega co-op investments, team inventions and group entrepreneurship, all helping ensure that they will never revert to the daily miseries of poverty. Cloned tropics-wide, the described Philippine system will form quadrillion-dollar level markets that will benefit all the world's businesses. The most significant benefit however will be the democratization of wealth out of the world's transport fuel sales. Instead of quadrillion-dollar wealth getting bottled up as usual among a few oligarchs of the world's oil cartels, wealth from ethanol production will be shared by billions of ordinary employees and their allied corporate investors that together form mega co-ops. For their part, the said cartels will merely reduce their oil-based incomes, for E85 engines (able to climb upland slopes) will still use 15% gasoline, and said engines will geometrically multiply in number of units as mega co-ops expand tropics wide. To compensate for the income reduction, said oligarchs should invest in mega co-op joint venture and build-operate-transfer projects especially in infrastructures that require massive investments.
For startup ethanol distillation, fifty mega co-ops may contribute P10 million each, several 1st World CSR companies may invest $4 million, and the joint venture may sell $27 million in ten-year bonds to 1st World Green Funds and Aid agencies. The combined capital and loans should finance 50 imported juicing mills for each of the 50 investing co-ops as sweet sorghum growers, one central ethanol distillery, and factories for manufacturing bottled sweet sorghum syrup and vinegar, packaged cookies, and livestock feed pellets in sacks for export. Sorghum planting may be made in upland strip plots that surround reforested 'islands' of 30-50 hectares each. The sorghum plots will double as fire breaks while the forest 'islands' will double as wind breaks, thereby minimizing fire or typhoon damage if any. Each farm's strip plots may total 200-300 hectares in area to guarantee volume production for the distillery and factories.
Ethanol marketing may be done by co-op clusters' central marketing companies. Concurrent with start of ethanol production, mega co-op joint venture companies must set up companies that convert local vehicles from diesel and gasoline to ethanol-gasoline fueled engines at 85% ethanol (E85). Once build-operate-transfer companies have set up mini hydropower chains and geothermal plants, the same joint ventures may later manufacture brand new E85-fueled vehicles using imported all-electric steel mills and parts-making equipment. Some 2 billion tons of local iron ore and magnetite sand plus over 100 million tons of local nickel and chromite deposits should ensure low-cost raw material supply for the metal works, which means low-priced E85 vehicles. Said vehicles may be sold locally and tropics-wide to replace gasoline and diesel-fueled transports, thus help reduce more CO2 emissions to the atmosphere. Widespread use of E85 vehicles will greatly reduce high prices of all local goods and services because current transport costs incident to gasoline and diesel use are exceedingly high (almost triple future ethanol prices), with signs of more price increases for current fuels over the horizon.
Prospective joint venture engine conversion and vehicle manufacturing partners may be auto companies in Brazil, Italy, Germany, USA and Japan who all currently fabricate and sell flex-fuel vehicles (10% to 100% ethanol) at combined million-level units per year. The ultimate target: majority of 3rd World vehicles ethanol-fueled, thereby reducing current transport costs by 70% or so. Petrochemical imports should likewise be reduced to bare minimum, and CO2 transport emissions down by 50-70%. 15% gasoline in E85 fuel is equivalent to premium gasoline. Ethanol may also be used tropics-wide to replace firewood and LPG as cooking fuels for cost reduction, saving of forests and global cooling purposes.
Some of the strip plots previously described should be planted to stevia, a small leafy plant whose leaves when dried and powdered may be packed as diabetes-preventive sweetener which is 300 times sweeter than sugar. Stevia may be exported to expatriate Filipinos' sideline marketing companies for sale to wholesalers, retailers, hospitals and food factories, and be a standard retailing product in ASEAN Festival malls. Stevia processing and sales may be made thru joint ventures between mega co-ops and local producers that already export the product at limited quantities.
What should be the carbon mitigation and social effects? Applied tropics-wide, ethanol production will prevent further million-ton CO2 emissions each year from the tropics. Ethanol-powered transports will greatly reduce the masses' food costs, since transport costs form major shares in current food mark-ups in the 3rd World tropics. Said transports will also enable farmgate prices to rise due to higher demand incident to greatly enhanced transport accessibility. In the Philippines, current farmgate prices can be as low as 10% of urban market retailing prices due to ultra-expensive petrochemical fuels used by transports. Mega co-op and employee groups' farms equipped with E85 cargo trucks will enable such producers to engage in direct retailing of harvests in city markets, which means high profit margins for producers yet low prices for consumers. Finally, endless production of indicated products will give regular and high-rate salaries to millions of new Elementary-level Philippine rural employees, enabling them to afford College education for job promotion, mega co-op investments, team inventions and group entrepreneurship, all helping ensure that they will never revert to the daily miseries of poverty. Cloned tropics-wide, the described Philippine system will form quadrillion-dollar level markets that will benefit all the world's businesses. The most significant benefit however will be the democratization of wealth out of the world's transport fuel sales. Instead of quadrillion-dollar wealth getting bottled up as usual among a few oligarchs of the world's oil cartels, wealth from ethanol production will be shared by billions of ordinary employees and their allied corporate investors that together form mega co-ops. For their part, the said cartels will merely reduce their oil-based incomes, for E85 engines (able to climb upland slopes) will still use 15% gasoline, and said engines will geometrically multiply in number of units as mega co-ops expand tropics wide. To compensate for the income reduction, said oligarchs should invest in mega co-op joint venture and build-operate-transfer projects especially in infrastructures that require massive investments.
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