Noble purchases sugarcane mills

Noble Group, a Hong Kong-headquartered agricultural, industrial and energy products company, has acquired two sugarcane/ethanol mills in the state of Sao Paulo, Brazil. Both the mills, Catanduva and Potirendaba, are fully operational, situated 50km apart from each other and located just over 100km from Noble’s UNP facility. Catanduva has a nominal sugarcane crushing capacity of 4.6 million tonnes, while Potirendaba crushes 3.4 million tonnes per annum. Combined, it is envisaged that at full production they will produce 600,000 tonnes of sugar, 300,000m3 of ethanol and supply over 300,000MWh to the grid. The two facilities have good access to domestic and foreign markets and are located close to competitive rail infrastructure. The mills have a strong operational track record and are active in both domestic and export markets. The acquisition will be funded from existing resources. In addition to Catanduva and Potirendaba, Noble’s two existing mills have a nominal annual crushing capacity of 9.5 million tonnes of cane per annum and can produce approximately 740,000 tonnes of sugar, 300,000m3 of ethanol a year, while also being capable of supplying 450,000MWh of surplus electricity to the grid.