Ethanol: In compliance with the provisions of Act 693/01, the country began to implement initiatives for alcohol fuel from sugar cane. At the moment 5 ethanol plants are running: Incauca, Providencia, Manuelita, Mayaguez and Risaralda refineries that produce about 1,050,000 liters of alcohol fuel a day and this production is mainly to supply the domestic market. It is estimated a domestic demand close to 1,500,000 liters per day to cover the 10% of blending needs.

Likewise, in the country several alcohol production projects are being implemented in several departments: Antioquia, Boyaca, Santander and the coast, derived from different raw materials such as sugar cane, sugar beet, banana and cassava.

Unfortunately, due to the economic crisis there is absence of new plants. Projects are standstill, and Ecopetrol plant would only come into operation in 2011, starting with a production of 385,000 liters a day. At the moment there is another project being developed in Magdalena, where an international company sowed a very large sugar cane area for producing an average of 300,000 liters a day. With this, the 20% blending could be reached by in 2012 without any problem.

Biodiesel: At the moment there are five projects under construction for producing biodiesel from oil palm (Oleoflores — already in production, Odin Energy, Biocombustibles Sostenibles del Caribe) and two in the eastern region (Biocastilla, Bio D. SA). In addition, they are other projects under development, one in the central region (ECOPETROL), one in the eastern region (Manuelita), one in the west region and another in the north region. In 2008 it is expected they shall enter into production, with a total amount of 400,000 t/year (19).

How are investments for biodiesel production doing? Construction of the Ecopetrol plant in Barrancabermeja is almost over. With this in total there will be seven plants in the country. A total installed capacity of 526,000 biodiesel tonnes a year may be achieved.

2. Conclusions

It must be accepted that the so-called modern man now has the same challenge our ancestors solved centuries ago, that life is not over. Availability of natural resources and the way we use them, force us to shape a scenario of technological innovations and social coexistence, in which the ethics of life prevails over money; this becomes more valid in this global world that requires new economic, lifestyle, consumption and value models.

Society needs energy for its development, but development does not necessarily imply a waste of energy. In any productive process, materials and water may or may not be wasted, but it is certain that it will consume energy and that energy consumption will be associated with a real environmental impact. If energy production takes on all costs, it would be much more expensive.

New energy sources are the new economic, political and even environmental strategy. Their importance is such that currently over 30 raw materials are being tested worldwide. Despite this big boost, they do not yet provide a solution to the global energy problems.

Biofuels should not be taken as the solution to the energy and environmental problem, but as part of a complex human and energy project where leading countries still disagree on a solution. If Bioenergy is properly used, it provides a historic opportunity to contribute to the growth of many of the world’s poorest countries.

A reality must be emphasized; alcohol fuel is more expensive than gasoline and biodiesel. It is not good business that a market economy develops isolated and organically; the market must be intervened so these alternatives are viable, because rival fuel is cheaper. Oil is in the reservoir, while cassava, sugar cane, oil palm or other crops used as raw material must be planted, and in expensive lands. Then, by definition, we talk about a project that is viable only if the State intervenes so it can be operated outside the framework of the market.

The world faces complex challenges and life’s survival on the planet can not be supported on the solution to the renewable energy alternative based on biofuels, as it would grow the replacement of food crops with monocultures, deforestation for energy crops, while it would boost the diversity extinction, fertile lands and water reduction, and the social consequences population displacement causes.

In that sense the FAO has declared: Biofuel policies and subsidies should be urgently reviewed in order to preserve the goal of world food security, protect poor farmers, promote broad-based rural development and ensure environmental sustainability. But also states: Growing demand for biofuels and the resulting higher agricultural commodity prices offer important opportunities for some developing countries. Agriculture could become the growth engine for hunger reduction and poverty alleviation, production of biofuel feedstocks may create income and employment, if particularly poor small farmers receive support to expand their production and gain access to markets.

It also requires a certification system that ensures that biofuels will be marketed only if they have the necessary environmental requirements.

Colombia is not and cannot be indifferent to the global market trend for crude oil and its derivatives. This fact gives the opportunity for goods production, such as biofuels, that allow diversity in the energy basket available in the domestic market and that can be exported to international markets. However, a necessary condition for competing in the international market is efficient conditions for the production of these goods.

Colombia has enough available land for growing biofuels, from 14 million hectares for agriculture business and 20 for livestock, only 5 million are currently in use and the remaining is for extensive cattle ranching; a better use could be biofuels which would provide plant cover and rural income opportunities. It also holds high productivity in sugar production from sugar cane, but such activity has been focused on agribusiness models, where production is held in few companies from renowned economic groups.

Although in Colombia ethanol has been a biofuel pioneer, biodiesel projects are gaining strength and this fuel can have a greater impact and national coverage.

In the country there is a poor use of natural resources and a high dependence on them; there is not full agreement between vocation or fair and the use of resources. Productivity paradigm boosts to predatory models and the economic efficiency and profitability fallacy as sole indicator, productive projects that do not consider social and environmental benefits are presented.

Then, in the previous horizon, it is required to develop a long-term sustainable agriculture that is compatible with the environment. The aim of this is a critical reassessment of the current modernizing model, taking into account that different technological offers, articulated to a diverse set of socio-economic and environmental factors, require different technological solutions. Consequently, decisions about biofuels should consider the food safety situation but also land and water availability.

Energy has deep and broad relations with the three sustainability dimensions (economic, social and environmental); i. e., it must go into the integration, harmonization and optimization. The services energy provides help to meet several basic needs such as: water supply, lighting, health, ability for producing, transporting and processing food, mobility and information access so that access to a certain amount of advanced forms of energy such as electricity or liquid fuels and gaseous fuels, should be included among the inalienable human rights in the XXIst century. Energy supply safety and energy prices are crucial for economic development. On the other hand, it is clear that many ways of producing and consuming can reduce environmental sustainability. We must ask: is the current energy production and consumption sustainable? One of the most important challenges humanity faces is to find the way to produce and use energy so that in the long term human development is promoted, in all its dimensions: social, economic and environmental.

Finally, to balance the enthusiasm with objectivity: it is necessary to carefully study the economic, social and environmental bioenergy impact before deciding how fast it is desired to be developed, and what technologies, policies, investment and research strategies to follow.