An ECOICE Initiative · ETHANABER™ Proprietary Process
The Grave Reality, Today
A war 3,000 km away can change the cost of feeding a billion people.
Every tonne of India's urea begins with hydrogen made from natural gas — and two-thirds of that gas comes from imports. When one shipping route through the Strait of Hormuz becomes unstable, the price of feeding India moves within weeks. No drought. No crop failure. No change in Indian farming. Fertilizer prices still nearly triple.
India's Urea Subsidy, FY26
₹1.19lakh crore/yr
India's single largest direct subsidy line — and it moves with a market India doesn't control.
What Government Absorbs, Per Tonne
₹20,000–61,000per tonne
The farmer always pays ₹5,360. The gap above is what Delhi quietly covers — wider in a crisis, still large in a calm year.
Domestic Gas Meets
~33% of demand
India's 30 gas-based urea plants need 46–50 MMSCMD. Domestic fields supply only 14–17. The rest is imported, at a premium.
There's a different way to grow nitrogen
Ending India's dependence on imported fossil gas — one molecule of ethanol at a time.
Project BioUrea™ turns sugarcane into renewable ethyl acetate, green hydrogen, green ammonia and green urea — with no natural gas, no imported LNG, and no acetic acid anywhere in the process. A closed carbon loop that could rewrite how a billion people are fed.
B-Heavy Molasses Route
Zero fossil feedstock
100% indigenous & renewable
The Solution, In Numbers
One complex. Five products. A closed loop.
Every number below is explained, not just displayed — hover or read on for why each one matters.
0t/yr
Renewable Ethyl Acetate
The volume engine of the plant — 84% of revenue, made without a drop of acetic acid.
0t/yr
Green Hydrogen
A genuine co-product, not a purchase. This is what makes the whole nitrogen chain below possible.
0t/yr
Green Ammonia
Made via Haber-Bosch like any ammonia — except the hydrogen came from cane, not gas.
0t/yr
BioUrea™ (46% N)
Identical spec to conventional urea. The farmer notices nothing different — the country does.
0t/yr
Sugar Co-Produced
The B-heavy route's second business — a revenue stream potentially larger than the chemicals platform itself.
0tCO&sub2;e
Emissions Avoided / yr
Equivalent to pulling ~28,000 passenger cars off Indian roads, every single year.
The Four Numbers That Matter
What this actually is worth
Explore each dimension — mass, energy, economics, carbon — in its own tab above.
Total Revenue
₹184.5Cr/yr
Ethyl acetate + BioUrea + CO&sub2; only. Sugar (₹329–363 Cr) and power export (₹44 Cr) sit outside this — see Economics.
Core EBITDA Range
₹19–47Cr/yr
Swings on one decision: open-market vs. captive ethanol. The single biggest lever in the model.
Avoided Emissions
~65,000tCO&sub2;e/yr
Range 53,400–76,800 tCO&sub2;e/yr. Equivalent to ~28,000 cars off the road, or 3 million trees planted.
Fertilizer Reach
40,700acres
Green fertilizer for Indian farmland, from Indian sugarcane, under Indian sun.
Why B-Heavy
The route that keeps both sugar and fertilizer alive
Three cane-to-ethanol routes were evaluated. B-heavy molasses is the balance point — a genuine sugar business alongside the chemicals platform, at a realistic mill scale.
| Route | L Ethanol / t Cane | Cane Required | Acreage | Sugar Co-Produced | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| C-Heavy Molasses | 10.8 | 1.83M t | 56,559 ac | 210,800 t | Sugar-dominant, mill ~7× larger |
| B-Heavy Molasses — SELECTED | 21.75 | 910,345 t | 28,097 ac | 86,483 t | Balanced — matches your visuals |
| Full Juice / Syrup | 84 | 235,714 t | 7,272 ac | 0 t | No sugar business at all |
Cross-checked, not assumed: your visuals show 910,000 t cane / ~28,084 acres / 86,500 t sugar / ₹346 Cr revenue for B-heavy. Independently recalculated here: 910,345 t / 28,097 ac / 86,483 t / ₹329–363 Cr — ₹346 Cr sits exactly at the midpoint. The numbers agree to within rounding.
Process & Plant
15 process blocks, two integrated stages
ETHANABER™ catalytic dehydrogenation through to BioUrea™ prilling. Click any diagram to zoom into individual process blocks.
Full complex — 15 process blocks, utilities & offsite facilitiesClick to zoom ↗
Block 3 — Catalytic Dehydrogenation
The core innovation
Fixed-bed tubular reactor, copper / copper-chromite catalyst. 240–270°C, 10–20 bar, 1–3 sec residence. Converts ethanol directly to ethyl acetate + hydrogen. No acetic acid in the reaction at all.
Block 6 — Hydrogen Purification
PSA to 99.99%
Pressure swing adsorption, dryer, buffer vessel. Nameplate 2.05 TPD (677 t/yr gross). This dashboard uses the PSA-corrected 647 t/yr net figure downstream — 95% recovery, applied consistently.
Block 13 — BioUrea™ Plant
Ammonia + CO&sub2; → Urea
HP reactor, carbamate condenser + stripper, decomposer, evaporator, vacuum concentrator, prilling. Output 46% N BioUrea™, identical spec to conventional urea — drop-in for the farmer.
Equipment & materials
Two stages, itemised
Stage 1 & 2 equipment, common utilities, material distributionClick to zoom ↗
Class-5 equipment cost, by process section
Order-of-magnitude estimate (±50%), built from standard sizing heuristics on our own mass balance. Not a bankable BOQ — vendor quotes required before financing.
| Section | Equipment Cost | Fab. Steel | Key equipment |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. ETHANABER reactor train | ₹1.70 Cr | 40.3 t | Dehydrogenation reactors (×2), Cu-Cr catalyst |
| 2. Separation / distillation | ₹2.14 Cr | 77.4 t | Recycle + purification columns (azeotrope duty) |
| 3. Hydrogen purification | ₹2.05 Cr | — | PSA package + H₂ compressor to 150–200 bar |
| 4. Ammonia synthesis | ₹5.67 Cr | 89.5 t | Syngas compressor, Fe-catalyst converter, ASU |
| 5. Urea synthesis & finishing | ₹3.97 Cr | 57.9 t | Ti-clad reactor + stripper, granulator |
| 6. CO&sub2; recovery & liquefaction | ₹1.58 Cr | 62.6 t | Scrubber, compressor, food-grade bottling |
| 7. Storage & utilities | ₹3.00 Cr | 163.2 t | Tankage, cooling tower, DCS/PLC |
| Total Purchased Equipment | ₹20.11 Cr | 490.8 t | |
| Total Installed (Lang 3.5–4.5×) | ₹70.4–90.5 Cr | ~1,915–2,514 t | incl. structural + piping steel |
Carbon Steel
~55%
Stainless 304/316
~30%
Duplex / Ti-Clad
~8%
Alloy / Cr-Mo
~5%
Why 8% of the steel drives the cost: the urea reactor and stripper need duplex/titanium-clad steel because ammonium carbamate is brutally corrosive — just 29 tonnes of steel costing ₹2.80 Cr, roughly 10× the ₹/tonne of the plain carbon-steel storage tanks. Any estimate that ignores this metallurgy will under-price the plant.
Mass Balance
Four reactions govern the whole complex
Every downstream number is stoichiometry applied to the stage before it — not a market estimate. Molar masses: ethanol 46.07, EtAc 88.11, H₂ 2.016, CO&sub2; 44.01, NH₃ 17.03, urea 60.06.
1 · Fermentation (existing distillery)C₆H₁₂O₆ → 2 C₂H₅OH + 2 CO₂
2 · ETHANABER™ dehydrogenative coupling2 C₂H₅OH → CH₃COOC₂H₅ + 2 H₂
3 · Haber-Bosch synthesisN₂ + 3 H₂ → 2 NH₃
4 · Urea synthesis2 NH₃ + CO₂ → CO(NH₂)₂ + H₂O
No acetic acid, anywhere. ETHANABER is direct dehydrogenative coupling — conventional ethyl acetate plants esterify acetic acid + ethanol. That one difference means zero exposure to acetic acid pricing, and it's why this route needs roughly double the ethanol per tonne of product (half the ethanol becomes hydrogen, not ethyl acetate) — which is exactly what makes the downstream green hydrogen → ammonia → urea chain possible.
B-Heavy chain — cane to ethanol
| Stream | Value | Calculation | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sugarcane crushed | 910,345 t/yr | 19.8M L ÷ 21.75 L/t cane | Cross-checked |
| Sugar co-produced | 86,483 t/yr | 910,345 × 95 kg/t cane | Cross-checked |
| Ethanol plant capacity | 15,622 t/yr | 60,000 L/d × 0.789 × 330 d | 330-day basis |
| Cane acreage required | 28,097 ac | 910,345 ÷ 32.4 t/acre | Cross-checked |
Nameplate vs. operating days: the P&ID states "21,900 KLPY" (60 KLPD × 365 calendar days). This dashboard uses 330 operating days throughout (~90% uptime), giving 19,800 KLPY / 15,622 t/yr. Both are valid — just never mix them in one calculation.
ETHANABER™ → BioUrea™ — the full chain
| Stream | Value | Calculation | vs. Visual |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ethyl acetate | 14,883 t/yr | 50,000 L/d × 0.902 × 330 d | Matches exactly |
| Ethanol required | 15,881 t/yr | 14,883 × (2×46.07÷88.11) ÷ 0.98 | 259 t/yr (1.7%) above distillery capacity |
| Hydrogen, gross | 681 t/yr | 14,883 × (2×2.016÷88.11) | Visual: 677 t / 2.05 TPD — matches |
| Hydrogen, usable | 647 t/yr | 681 × 95% PSA recovery | PSA loss applied |
| Fermentation CO&sub2;, recovered | 13,431 t/yr | 14,923 gross × 90% capture | Capture eff. applied |
| Green ammonia | 3,534 t/yr | 647 × (2×17.03÷3×2.016) × 0.97 | Visual: 11.6 TPD — uses gross H₂ |
| BioUrea™ | 6,108 t/yr | 3,534 × (60.06÷2×17.03) × 0.98 | Visual: 6,105 t — matches |
| CO&sub2; to urea | 4,567 t/yr | 3,534 × (44.01÷2×17.03) | — |
| CO&sub2; surplus (food grade / dry ice) | 8,864 t/yr | 13,431 − 4,567 | Visual: 9,940 — likely omits capture eff. |
Circularity — it grows more than it consumes
01
Cane land
28,097 ac
→
02
Ethanol
15,622 t
→
03
Ethyl Acetate
14,883 t
→
04
Hydrogen
647 t
→
05
Ammonia
3,534 t
→
06
BioUrea™
6,108 t
→
07
Fertilizes
40,700 ac
Verified against real agronomy: at 150 kg urea/acre/yr — independently confirmed against Indian sources citing 130–200 kg/acre specifically for sugarcane — 6,108 t of BioUrea™ feeds 40,700 acres. That's the crop this project is built around, not a generic figure. At 250 kg/acre for high-yield cane, reach is 24,420 acres — both figures shown in your visuals.
Energy Balance
Powered entirely by the cane's own bagasse
No coal, no grid dependency for the core process — the biomass the mill already produces runs the whole cascade.
| Consumer | Basis | MWh/yr |
|---|---|---|
| Ethyl acetate — thermal (steam) | 14,883 t × 1,200 kWh-th/t | 17,860 |
| Ethyl acetate — electrical | 14,883 t × 150 kWh-e/t | 2,232 |
| Ammonia loop + ASU | 3,534 t × 750 kWh-e/t | 2,651 |
| Urea granulation | 6,108 t × 180 kWh-e/t | 1,099 |
| CO&sub2; liquefaction | 8,864 t × 100 kWh-e/t | 886 |
| Total thermal demand | 17,860 | |
| Total electrical demand | 6,869 |
For scale: the entire new cascade's electricity draw (6,869 MWh/yr) is about what 5,700 average Indian households use in a year. The steam demand averages just ~3.3 tonnes/hour — a rounding error against a sugar mill's boiler house.
Is the bagasse enough?
Total bagasse energy pool
From 910,345 t/yr cane (B-heavy)
910,345 t × 29% yield = 264,000 t bagasse/yr. At 7.37 GJ/t and 80% boiler efficiency:
~431,900MWh-th/yr
New cascade needs
Thermal + electrical combined
The whole ETHANABER + ammonia + urea + CO&sub2; cascade, together:
24,729MWh/yr
Just 5.7% of the gross bagasse pool.
Honest flag: the gross pool comfortably exceeds the cascade's needs — roughly 17× headroom before the existing mill takes its share. But the existing sugar mill and distillery draw on that same bagasse first, and their exact steam consumption at this specific site has never been provided. The sufficiency conclusion is directionally strong but needs the mill's real boiler data to confirm, not an assumption.
Net energy position
New Cascade Demand
24,729MWh/yr
Gross Bagasse Pool
431,900MWh-th/yr
Headroom Before Mill Draw
17×demand covered
Economics
Per-plant P&L, every line shown
Toggle the ethanol sourcing scenario — it's the single biggest lever in the entire project.
Ethyl Acetate
₹3.1Cr
2.0% margin — razor thin
BioUrea™
₹10.4–12.9Cr
46–57% margin
CO&sub2; Bottling
₹5.9Cr
~83% margin
Core EBITDA Total
₹19–21Cr
on ₹184.5 Cr revenue
Ethyl Acetate
₹29.3Cr
18.9% margin
BioUrea™
₹10.4–12.9Cr
Unchanged
CO&sub2; Bottling
₹5.9Cr
Unchanged
Core EBITDA Total
₹45–47Cr
on ₹184.5 Cr revenue
Ethyl acetate — full build
| Line | Calculation | Open Market | Fwd-Integrated |
|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | 14,883t × ₹104,000 | ₹154.8 Cr | ₹154.8 Cr |
| Ethanol feedstock | 20.13M L × price | ₹130.8 Cr | ₹104.7 Cr |
| Utilities | steam + power | ₹3.8 Cr | ₹3.8 Cr |
| Opex (11% of rev) | catalyst+labour+maint | ₹17.0 Cr | ₹17.0 Cr |
| EBITDA | ₹3.1 Cr (2.0%) | ₹29.3 Cr (18.9%) |
Break-even selling price: ₹101.7/kg on open-market ethanol (2.3% cushion) vs. ₹81.9/kg forward-integrated (real cushion). Sensitivity: ₹1/kg EtAc price ≈ ₹1.33 Cr EBITDA; ₹1/L ethanol ≈ ₹2.01 Cr. Ethanol sourcing is worth a ₹26 Cr/yr swing on this one product alone.
BioUrea™ — fully-loaded OPEX
| Item | Conservative | Adjusted | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Electricity | ₹2.62 Cr | ₹2.62 Cr | NH₃ loop + granulation, rebuilt |
| Labour | ₹1.60 Cr | ₹1.07 Cr | ⅓ shared with EtAc crew |
| Packaging | ₹1.50 Cr | ₹0.38 Cr | Bulk vs. retail bagging |
| Maintenance | ₹1.30 Cr | ₹0.87 Cr | Shared overhead |
| Steam | ₹1.20 Cr | ₹1.20 Cr | |
| Nitrogen (ASU) | ₹1.11 Cr | ₹1.11 Cr | |
| Carbon Dioxide | ₹0.91 Cr | ₹0.91 Cr | Corrected from a 10× error |
| Administration | ₹0.80 Cr | ₹0.53 Cr | |
| Chemicals | ₹0.60 Cr | ₹0.45 Cr | Catalyst line stripped |
| Cooling + DM water | ₹0.60 Cr | ₹0.60 Cr | |
| Total OPEX | ₹12.25 Cr | ₹9.74 Cr | |
| EBITDA (Rev ₹22.6 Cr) | ₹10.4 Cr (46%) | ₹12.9 Cr (57%) |
The honest structure: BioUrea is profitable because hydrogen is genuinely free — a byproduct of a reaction run anyway for ethyl acetate. Charge hydrogen at its ₹300/kg replacement value and the urea unit would lose ₹10.5 Cr/yr standalone. That's not a weakness; it's the whole point of integration. Urea contributes ~69% of core EBITDA despite being a fraction of revenue.
Sugar & power — the two upside lines
Sugar Co-Product (B-Heavy)
₹329–363Cr/yr revenue
86,483 t/yr at ₹38–42k/t. Belongs to the existing mill's economics, not modeled here — but potentially larger than the entire chemicals platform.
Power Export (unverified)
₹44.0Cr/yr
Rests on a 22–25 MW cogen assumption never checked against the mill's actual boiler capacity. Treat as upside pending verification.
Carbon Balance
A net-positive carbon story
Engineering-level screening estimate, not a certified LCA. Every figure traces to the mass and energy balance.
Avoided-emissions pathways & total conceptual impactClick to zoom ↗
| Avoided Pathway | Low | Mid | High | Basis |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ethyl acetate vs. fossil route | 26,800 | 34,200 | 41,700 | 14,883t × 1.8–2.8 kgCO&sub2;e/kg |
| BioUrea™ vs. grey urea | 11,000 | 15,300 | 19,500 | 6,108t × 1.8–3.2 tCO&sub2;e/t |
| Steam, bagasse vs. coal | — | 6,250 | — | 17,860 MWh × 0.35 |
| Electricity, bagasse vs. grid | — | 4,900 | — | 6,869 MWh × 0.71 |
| Subtotal — production only | 48,900 | 60,600 | 72,300 | |
| + Urea field hydrolysis (biogenic C) | +4,500 | 6,108t × 0.733 (IPCC) | ||
| Total, all boundaries | 53,400 | ~65,100 | 76,800 | |
The one caveat that must travel with this: the field-hydrolysis credit is CO&sub2;-only. N&sub2;O from the nitrogen pathway is identical whether urea is fossil or bio-sourced — this project does not reduce field N&sub2;O, and shouldn't be presented as if it does.
≈ Cars off the road
28,000per year
≈ Mature trees planted
3 Mequivalent
≈ Households' power offset
40,000Indian homes
The National Stakes
A war 3,000 km away changes the cost of Indian food
The policy case for this project, in the Government of India's own budget numbers.
46–50 MMSCMD gas required, only 14–17 MMSCMD domesticClick to zoom ↗
Total Fertilizer Subsidy FY26
₹1.68lakh Cr
Roughly 3% of the entire Union Budget, on one input.
Urea Subsidy Alone
₹1.19lakh Cr
India's single largest direct subsidy line item.
FY23 Crisis Peak
₹2.25lakh Cr
What one bad year in global gas markets costs India.
Domestic Gas Meets
~33% of need
Two-thirds of urea's core feedstock is imported.
Farmer pays ₹5,360/t always — government absorbs the restClick to zoom ↗
| Scenario | Cost/tonne | Farmer Pays | Subsidy Gap | Govt. Absorbs |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Normal market | ₹25,300–28,650 | ₹5,360 | ₹19,950–23,290 | ~80% |
| Crisis (Apr 2026, West Asia) | ₹65,300–66,850 | ₹5,360 | ₹59,960–61,490 | ~92% |
The single sharpest argument in this whole project: the incremental cost of green, hydrogen-route urea is roughly ₹5,000–25,000/tonne above conventional. India's own subsidy volatility — the swing from ₹19,950 to ₹61,490 per tonne between a calm year and a crisis — is larger than that entire gap. This isn't "green urea is cheap." It's "the volatility India already tolerates is bigger than the cost gap green urea needs to close."
What one plant saves the exchequer
Calm-Year Scenario
₹12.2–14.2Cr/yr avoided
6,108t × ~₹20,000–23,000/t subsidy gap
Crisis-Year Scenario
₹36.6–37.5Cr/yr avoided
What one plant would have saved during exactly the crisis India just lived through. Scale to 100 plants: ₹3,500–5,700 Cr/yr.
Agriculture & Circularity
From cane to clean fertilizer — all indigenous, all renewable
The full B-heavy loop from your visual, cross-checked against this dashboard's independent recalculation.
Sugarcane through CO&sub2; recovery — B-Heavy Molasses routeClick to zoom ↗
Sugarcane Land
28,097acres
Visual: ~28,084 — matches
Sugar Co-Produced
86,483t/yr
Visual: 86,500 — matches
BioUrea™
6,108t/yr
Visual: 6,105 — matches
Fertilizer Reach
40,700acres
At 150 kg/acre — matches
Application rate — verified for sugarcane
| Application Rate | Acreage Fertilized | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 150 kg/acre/yr | 40,700 acres | Mid-range Indian agronomy for cane — matches visual |
| 250 kg/acre/yr | 24,420 acres | Heavier dose for high-yield cane |
The vision, stated plainly: today, the nitrogen that grows India's food comes from gas pumped through the Strait of Hormuz. Project BioUrea™ grows it instead from sugarcane rooted in Indian soil — fixing carbon from the atmosphere, closing the loop, and handing the farmer the same product at the same price, with none of the geopolitical fragility. This is what a transition from a fossil agricultural economy to a renewable one actually looks like, one integrated complex at a time.