Resource potential of Ukraine for the production of biofuels

The agricultural sector has traditionally played an important role in the national economy of Ukraine. Existing soil and climatic conditions, natural-resource potential and human resources of the state create an effective and internationally competitive agricultural production. The increasing of the price and the reducing of the amount of the fossil energy sources have led to searching of the alternative energy sources. The total area of rich and fertile Ukrainian soils for cultivation of various crops is 32.5 million hectares. In Ukraine are grown such energy crops as: starch containing (rye, wheat, corn), sugar containing (sugar beets, sugar sorghum), oil containing (canola, soybean, sunflower). Soil fertility guarantees a basic level of yield of these crops, for example in the year of 2010 it was: winter wheat and spring – 3.67 t / ha, corn – 4.59 t / ha, sugar beets – 35.4 t / ha, rape – 2.0 t / ha, soybean – 1.51 t / ha, sunflower – 1.52 t / ha. Today we export a large amount of such crops abroad, which can further be used not only for food supplies, but often for the production of biofuels. However, for Ukraine it is more economically effective to build plants and other facilities for production of bioethanol, biodiesel and biogas within the territory of our state. Due to the natural and climatic conditions, grain crop cultivation can be possible not all over the globe, however, grain is the ideal product for long term storage and transportation. As for Ukraine, the increasing of growing grain crops has started since 80-s of XX century. In general, the year of 2010 was unfavorable for growing crops in the world, but the total yield of grain crops in Ukraine was 14611.2 tons, which allowed our country not only to satisfy the domestic needs of the state, but also allowed to keep a certain part for export. The effective feedstock for the production of bioethanol in Ukraine is also sugar beets. About 80-100 liters of bioethanol can be produced from a tone of sugar beets. It means that in order to produce 1 ton of bioethanol we need to process 12.7 – 15.9 tons of sugar beets. Production of bioethanol from sugar beets requires 20-30% less energy than from raw grain. Annual demand of our agricultural complex in diesel fuel is 1.870 thousand ton. The research work of leading Ukrainian scientists confirms that if Ukraine sows and it is quite possible, 3 million hectares of rape seeds, which would allow producing about 3 million tons of biodiesel, the annual necessity for 100 percent needs of agricultural complex in diesel fuel will be ensured. Agriculture in Ukraine today has not only focused on production for human consumption. The last few years the agricultural sector of Ukraine started to implement a comprehensive estimation of resource potential and create new types of energy crops for processing into biofuels.