Sri Lanka’s LOLC group to build ethanol power plant

Sri Lanka’s LOLC group, which has taken over a defunct sugar firm in a public-private partnership, is planning to build an ethanol-based power plant, the company said. LOLC Deputy Chairman Ishara Nanayakkara told shareholders in the annual report that the revived plant will produce sugar and ethanol, which will fire a six-megawatt power plant. Nanayakkara said about 4,000 farmer families were involved with the project. LOLC says it has also taken control of Sundaya Lanka, a solar energy firm. “As proponents of renewable energy sources we will actively propagate the use of solar energy amongst rural communities to assist in farming methodologies and to decrease their dependence on less efficient/more expensive fossil fuel energy sources,” Nanayakkara said. LOLC said it had experience in rural energy financing after it became involved in a World Bank funded off-grid energy project. Sundaya Lanka is now building a workshop in Sri Lanka’s Pannala area, the firm said. (June 11, 2008)