Brazilian state-run energy giant Petroleo Brasileiro (PBR), or Petrobras, signed a deal with the country's Navy to test biofuels at extremely low temperatures.
Brazilian state-run energy giant Petroleo Brasileiro (PBR), or Petrobras, signed a deal with the country's Navy to test biofuels at extremely low temperatures.

Petrobras will invest 3 million Brazilian reals ($1.69 million) as part of the four-year deal, which includes installation of a fuel depot at the Navy's Comandante Ferraz base in the Antarctic. The company signed the accord at a ceremony in Rio de Janeiro on Tuesday.

The company will study the efficiency of biodiesel and ethanol in the harsh climate of the Antarctic. The studies could improve the use of such biofuels in the milder winter conditions in Europe , for example.

Petrobras downstream director Paulo Roberto Costa told the local Estado news agency that the tests were a first step in a possible transition toward greater use of biofuels for heating in cold weather countries.

"But we're now only going to initiate tests, there's no forecast for a substitution of the fuels used today by these biofuels," Costa said.

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