(Notícia em Inglês)
Biodiesel output in Italy, a major producer in the European Union, is likely to have fallen in 2010 due to an increased inflow of cheaper imports and the trend may continue this year, a senior industry official said on Monday.
Italian biodiesel makers, who use mostly imported raw materials including palm oil and rapeseed, have been hit hard last year by cheap imported fuel which sometimes costs less than their raw materials, industry experts have said.
In the first nine months of 2010, Italy produced about 410,000 tonnes of biodiesel, signaling a fall in annual output last year against 2009 when output came in at 795,118 tonnes, said Maria Rosaria Di Somma, director general of the industry body Assocostieri-Unione Productori Biocarburanti.
"I think it's difficult to have produced 300,000 tonnes in the last three months (of 2010 to match 2009 output). I think there was a decline (in annual output)," Di Somma told Reuters in a telephone interview.
Di Somma said full-year 2010 output estimates would come in about a month and it was too early to give forecasts for 2011.
fox43.com»
Biodiesel output in Italy, a major producer in the European Union, is likely to have fallen in 2010 due to an increased inflow of cheaper imports and the trend may continue this year, a senior industry official said on Monday.
Italian biodiesel makers, who use mostly imported raw materials including palm oil and rapeseed, have been hit hard last year by cheap imported fuel which sometimes costs less than their raw materials, industry experts have said.
In the first nine months of 2010, Italy produced about 410,000 tonnes of biodiesel, signaling a fall in annual output last year against 2009 when output came in at 795,118 tonnes, said Maria Rosaria Di Somma, director general of the industry body Assocostieri-Unione Productori Biocarburanti.
"I think it's difficult to have produced 300,000 tonnes in the last three months (of 2010 to match 2009 output). I think there was a decline (in annual output)," Di Somma told Reuters in a telephone interview.
Di Somma said full-year 2010 output estimates would come in about a month and it was too early to give forecasts for 2011.
fox43.com»