Meeting ethanol target a problem: study

Australia could face a major biosecurity problem if the federal government's biofuel production target is met.
Oil companies have been told to create a modest 350 megalitres of biofuels by 2010 in response to climate change and concerns oil is running out.
The major biofuel in Australia is ethanol, which is made from sugar cane and grain.
But a government research paper released on Thursday says Australia may be forced to import wheat if the target is met and the drought is still raging.
"If all of the ethanol capacity that is currently proposed was to be fulfilled by existing crops ... it could force the import of wheat in drought years," the paper said.
"There are biosecurity issues restricting the import of grain from overseas markets."
Australia's wheat growers, on average, generate enough grain to make the nation self sufficient and has about a 16 per cent share of the global market in the golden grain.
If wheat was to be imported, Biosecurity Australia would have to conduct an assessment of the grain.
In January this year, maize, sunflower, sorghum, soybean and wheat from Argentina and soybean from Paraguay were permitted, subject to strict quarantine conditions.
Meanwhile, the research paper, from the government's Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation, says it could be possible to produce as much as 22 per cent of Australia's petrol from export fractions of wheat and coarse grains.
Coarse grains include maize and other cereals other than wheat and rice.
That prediction rose dramatically when the researchers looked at the next generation of biofuel production.
The paper suggests Australia may be able to achieve complete petrol self-sufficiency from developing technology which aims to derive ethanol from plant cells.
"Preliminary estimates show that upper limits for second generation biofuels to replace petrol may be between 10 and 140 per cent of our current petrol usage," the paper said.
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