🇮🇳 India has found a way to grow part of its oil supply in a field. That is the real significance of E20. India now blends 20% ethanol into petrol, five years ahead of its original target. For a country importing nearly 90% of its crude, replacing even part of that dependency with sugarcane, maize and other domestic feedstocks is strategically enormous. But it doesn't eliminate dependency. It moves some of it. Oil security becomes agricultural capacity. Refinery economics become crop economics. And the more ethanol India demands, the more land, water and grain allocation become part of energy policy. That is why the argument over slightly lower mileage misses the bigger experiment. India is actively changing what goes into a car's fuel tank. At the same time, it's trying to connect its farms, fuel system and energy security into the same machine. And if E20 is only the beginning, the limiting factor may eventually be less about how much ethanol an engine can burn than how much ethanol India can sustainably grow. Source: DW, ICRIER / Writer: Oliver