BP and Brazilian agriculture and food company Bunge have agreed to create a 50-50 joint venture, BP Bunge Bioenergia, and to combined their biofuels and biopower businesses to make BP Bunge Bioenergia a leading bioenergy (biofuels and biopower) company in Brazil, one of the most dynamic markets for biofuels worldwide.
The joint venture will have 11 biofuels sites in five Brazilian States (3 sites in the key region of São Paulo), with a total crushing capacity of 32 Mt/year (second largest capacity in Brazil) and a production capacity of 2.2 billion liters of ethanol equivalent per year (around 8.5% of the country's ethanol production in 2018). Waste biomass from the sugar cane will be burnt in cogeneration facilities to power all the biofuel production sites and surplus electricity will be sold to the Brazilian power grid (1.2 TWh of bio-power injected into the national grid in 2018).
BP Bunge Bioenergia bets on the new low carbon transport policy ("RenovaBio") to encourage continued growth in the biofuel market and support development of the sugarcane ethanol industry.