IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/bstrat/v18y2009i8p528-541.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Driving on liquid sunshine – the Brazilian biofuel experience: a policy driven analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Clovis Zapata
  • Paul Nieuwenhuis

Abstract

This paper analyses Brazil's experience with biofuels, focusing on the central role of the federal government as the main force driving the implementation of alternative locally produced ethanol (ethyl alcohol) and biodiesel. The pioneering, large scale ethanol programme that started over 30 years ago can be considered the most successful experience with the use of biofuels to date, as the government was able to rapidly implement the use of ethanol (ethyl alcohol) as a substitute for petrol in the 1970s and 1980s. The work contributes to the general discussion of sustainable and renewable energy sources and sets out the key policy mechanisms used. The paper also innovatively looks at the second large governmental intervention in the renewable fuels market – the biodiesel programme. In addition to the contribution to the debate surrounding command‐and‐control measures and economic incentive instruments, the paper analyses how lessons learned from the ethanol experiment were taken into consideration in the design and implementation of the biodiesel mandate, including social and environmental facets. It emphasizes the uniqueness of producing sugarcane ethanol in the Brazilian context and how attempts to carry out similar fast growing biofuels programmes may not be possible in other parts of the world. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.

Suggested Citation

  • Clovis Zapata & Paul Nieuwenhuis, 2009. "Driving on liquid sunshine – the Brazilian biofuel experience: a policy driven analysis," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 18(8), pages 528-541, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:bstrat:v:18:y:2009:i:8:p:528-541
    DOI: 10.1002/bse.616
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1002/bse.616
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1002/bse.616?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Collantes, Gustavo O, 2006. "The California Zero-Emission Vehicle Mandate: A Study of the Policy Process, 1990-2004," Institute of Transportation Studies, Working Paper Series qt9030893m, Institute of Transportation Studies, UC Davis.
    2. Sperling, Daniel, 1987. "Brazil, ethanol and the process of system change," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 11-23.
    3. Gustavsson, Leif & Börjesson, Pål & Johansson, Bengt & Svenningsson, Per, 1995. "Reducing CO2 emissions by substituting biomass for fossil fuels," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 20(11), pages 1097-1113.
    4. Collantes, Gustavo, 2006. "The California Zero-Emission Vehicle Mandate: A Study of the Policy Process, 1990-2004," University of California Transportation Center, Working Papers qt7672m22n, University of California Transportation Center.
    5. Moreira, Jose R. & Goldemberg, Jose, 1999. "The alcohol program," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 27(4), pages 229-245, April.
    6. Shiv Prasad & Dhanya M S, 2011. "Air Quality and Biofuels," Chapters, in: Marco Aurelio Dos Santos Bernardes (ed.), Environmental Impact of Biofuels, IntechOpen.
    7. Maxton,Graeme P. & Wormald,John, 2004. "Time for a Model Change," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521837156, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Charlotte Stead & Zia Wadud & Chris Nash & Hu Li, 2019. "Introduction of Biodiesel to Rail Transport: Lessons from the Road Sector," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(3), pages 1-20, February.
    2. de Aguiar, Thereza R.S. & Freire, Fatima de Souza, 2017. "Shifts in modes of governance and sustainable development in the Brazilian oil sector," European Management Journal, Elsevier, vol. 35(5), pages 701-710.
    3. Ribeiro, Barbara Esteves, 2013. "Beyond commonplace biofuels: Social aspects of ethanol," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 355-362.
    4. Wellington Spetic & Patricia Marquez & Robert Kozak, 2012. "Critical Areas and Entry Points for Sustainability‐Related Strategies in the Sugarcane‐Based Ethanol Industry of Brazil," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 21(6), pages 370-386, September.
    5. Michael Fotiadis & Michael L Polemis, 2018. "The Role of Sustainability‐Related Strategies on the Biofuel Industry: Trends, Prospects and Challenges," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(6), pages 757-772, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Talaei, Alireza & Ahadi, Mohammad Sadegh & Maghsoudy, Soroush, 2014. "Climate friendly technology transfer in the energy sector: A case study of Iran," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 349-363.
    2. Alonso-Pippo, Walfrido & Luengo, Carlos A. & Koehlinger, John & Garzone, Pietro & Cornacchia, Giacinto, 2008. "Sugarcane energy use: The Cuban case," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(6), pages 2163-2181, June.
    3. Vincent FRIGANT, 2009. "Is the automotive supply chain compatible with Corporate Social Responsible practices? (In French)," Cahiers du GREThA (2007-2019) 2009-08, Groupe de Recherche en Economie Théorique et Appliquée (GREThA).
    4. Maung, Thein A. & McCarl, Bruce A., 2013. "Economic factors influencing potential use of cellulosic crop residues for electricity generation," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 81-91.
    5. Rafael Alcadipani & John Hassard & Gazi Islam, 2018. "“ I Shot the Sheriff ”: Irony, Sarcasm and the Changing Nature of Workplace Resistance," Grenoble Ecole de Management (Post-Print) halshs-01959081, HAL.
    6. Campbell, Robert M. & Venn, Tyron J. & Anderson, Nathaniel M., 2016. "Social preferences toward energy generation with woody biomass from public forests in Montana, USA," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 58-67.
    7. Puppim de Oliveira, J. A., 2002. "The policymaking process for creating competitive assets for the use of biomass energy: the Brazilian alcohol programme," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 6(1-2), pages 129-140.
    8. Berndes, Goran & Hansson, Julia, 2007. "Bioenergy expansion in the EU: Cost-effective climate change mitigation, employment creation and reduced dependency on imported fuels," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(12), pages 5965-5979, December.
    9. Mercure, J.-F. & Paim, M.A. & Bocquillon, P. & Lindner, S. & Salas, P. & Martinelli, P. & Berchin, I.I. & de Andrade Guerra, J.B.S.O & Derani, C. & de Albuquerque Junior, C.L. & Ribeiro, J.M.P. & Knob, 2019. "System complexity and policy integration challenges: The Brazilian Energy- Water-Food Nexus," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 230-243.
    10. Jos#X00C9; Moreira, 2006. "Global Biomass Energy Potential," Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, Springer, vol. 11(2), pages 313-333, March.
    11. Wendler, Tobias & Töbelmann, Daniel & Günther, Jutta, 2021. "Natural resources and technology - on the mitigating effect of green tech," VfS Annual Conference 2021 (Virtual Conference): Climate Economics 242416, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    12. Brito, Thiago Luis Felipe & Islam, Towhidul & Stettler, Marc & Mouette, Dominique & Meade, Nigel & Moutinho dos Santos, Edmilson, 2019. "Transitions between technological generations of alternative fuel vehicles in Brazil," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).
    13. Prehoda, Emily W. & Pearce, Joshua M., 2017. "Potential lives saved by replacing coal with solar photovoltaic electricity production in the U.S," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 710-715.
    14. Nebojsa Dedovic & Sasa Igic & Todor Janic & Snezana Matic-Kekic & Ondrej Ponjican & Milan Tomic & Lazar Savin, 2012. "Efficiency of Small Scale Manually Fed Boilers —Mathematical Models," Energies, MDPI, vol. 5(5), pages 1-20, May.
    15. Borjesson, Pal & Gustavsson, Leif, 2000. "Greenhouse gas balances in building construction: wood versus concrete from life-cycle and forest land-use perspectives," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 28(9), pages 575-588, July.
    16. Thomas, Valerie & Kwong, Andrew, 2001. "Ethanol as a lead replacement: phasing out leaded gasoline in Africa," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 29(13), pages 1133-1143, November.
    17. Goldemberg, Jose & Coelho, Suani Teixeira & Lucon, Oswaldo, 2004. "How adequate policies can push renewables," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 32(9), pages 1141-1146, June.
    18. Szklo, Alexandre & Schaeffer, Roberto & Delgado, Fernanda, 2007. "Can one say ethanol is a real threat to gasoline?," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(11), pages 5411-5421, November.
    19. Witzel, Carl-Philipp & Finger, Robert, 2016. "Economic evaluation of Miscanthus production – A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 681-696.
    20. Domenico Morrone & Rosamartina Schena & Danilo Conte & Candida Bussoli & Angeloantonio Russo, 2022. "Between saying and doing, in the end there is the cost of capital: Evidence from the energy sector," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(1), pages 390-402, January.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:bstrat:v:18:y:2009:i:8:p:528-541. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1002/(ISSN)1099-0836 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.