page_title: Ethanol fuel in Brazil
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Ethanol fuel in Brazil / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Honda Titan CG 150 Mix Fuel Injection (gasoline-ethanol). This model is the first flexible-fuel motorcycle sold in the world. Location Itu, Sao Paulo, Brazil. This version shows the Mix Fuel lettering that identifies the Honda flexible-fuel models, and also a zoom in of the front panel with an arrow pointing to the fuel gauge which has a warning light for the minimum blend required to avoid cold start problems at low temperatures.
context_page_description: Brazil is the world's second largest producer of ethanol fuel. Brazil and the United States have led the industrial production of ethanol fuel for several years, together accounting for 85 percent of the world's production in 2017. Brazil produced 26.72 billion liters, representing 26.1 percent of the world's total ethanol used as fuel in 2017.
  Between 2006–2008, Brazil was considered to have the world's first "sustainable" biofuels economy and the biofuel industry leader, a policy model for other countries; and its sugarcane ethanol "the most successful alternative fuel to date." However, some authors consider that the successful Brazilian ethanol model is sustainable only in Brazil due to its advanced agri-industrial technology and its enormous amount of arable land available; while according to other authors it is a solution only for some countries in the tropical zone of Latin America, the Caribbean, and Africa.
  In recent years however, later-generation biofuels have sprung up which don't use food crops that are explicitly grown for fuel production.
context_section_description: Sugarcane has been cultivated in Brazil since 1532 as sugar was one of the first commodities exported to Europe by the Portuguese settlers. The first use of sugarcane ethanol as a fuel in Brazil dates back to the late twenties and early thirties of the twentieth century, with the introduction of the automobile in the country. Ethanol fuel production peaked during World War II and, as German submarine attacks threatened oil supplies, the mandatory blend became as high as 50% in 1943.
  After the end of the war cheap oil caused gasoline to prevail, and ethanol blends were only used sporadically, mostly to take advantage of sugar surpluses, until the seventies, when the first oil crisis resulted in gasoline shortages and awareness of the dangers of oil dependence. As a response to this crisis, the Brazilian government began promoting bioethanol as a fuel. The National Alcohol Program -Pró-Álcool- (Portuguese: Programa Nacional do Álcool), launched in 1975, was a nationwide program financed by the government to phase out automobile fuels derived from fossil fuels, such as gasoline, in favor of ethanol produced from sugar cane.
  The first phase of the program concentrated on production of anhydrous ethanol for blending with gasoline. The Brazilian government made mandatory the blending of ethanol fuel with gasoline, fluctuating from 1976 until 1992 between 10% to 22%. Due to this mandatory minimum gasoline blend, pure gasoline (E0) is no longer sold in the country. A federal law was passed in October 1993 establishing a mandatory blend of 22% anhydrous ethanol (E22) in the entire country. This law also authorized the Executive to set different percentages of ethanol within pre-established boundaries; and since 2003 these limits were fixed at a maximum of 25% (E25) and a minimum of 20% (E20) by volume. Since then, the government has set the percentage of the ethanol blend according to the results of the sugarcane harvest and the levels of ethanol production from sugarcane, resulting in blend variations even within the same year.
  Since July 2007 the mandatory blend is 25% of anhydrous ethanol and 75% gasoline or E25 blend. However, in 2010, and as a result of supply concerns and high ethanol fuel prices, the government mandated a temporary 90-day blend reduction from E25 to E20 beginning February 1, 2010. By mid March 2015 the government raised temporarily the ethanol blend in regular gasoline from 25% to 27%. The blend on premium gasoline was kept at 25% upon request by ANFAVEA, the Brazilian association of automakers, because of concerns about the effects on the higher blend on cars that were built for E25, as opposed to flex-fuel cars. The government approved the higher blend as an economic incentive for ethanol producers, due to an existing overstock of over 1 billion liters (264 million US gallons) of ethanol. The implementation of E27 is expected to allow the consumption of the overstock before the end of 2015.
  After testing in government fleets with several prototypes developed by the local carmakers, and compelled by the second oil crisis, the Fiat 147, the first modern commercial neat ethanol car (E100 only) was launched to the market in July 1979. The Brazilian government provided three important initial drivers for the ethanol industry: guaranteed purchases by the state-owned oil company Petrobras, low-interest loans for agro-industrial ethanol firms, and fixed gasoline and ethanol prices where hydrous ethanol sold for 59% of the government-set gasoline price at the pump. Subsidising ethanol production in this manner and setting an artificially low price established ethanol as an alternative to gasoline.
  After reaching more than 4 million cars and light trucks running on pure ethanol by the late 1980s, representing one third of the country's motor vehicle fleet, ethanol production and sales of ethanol-only cars tumbled due to several factors. First, gasoline prices fell sharply as a result of the 1980s oil glut, but mainly because of a shortage of ethanol fuel supply in the local market left thousands of vehicles in lin
caption: The 2009 Honda CG 150 Titan Mix was launched in the Brazilian market and became the first flex-fuel motorcycle sold in the world.
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