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"Ethanol provides about 15% of the countries transportation fuel."

Your link says, "Ethanol use has now expanded to account for thirty-seven percent (by volume) of fuel used by passenger cars." That's pretty impressive, and since that data was published I've read where government sources in Brazil are now claiming that ethanol satisfies better than 40% of Brazil's automotive fuel needs.

Maybe I'm just not reading carefully enough, but I cannot find in the page you linked us to where it says that ethanol only provides 15% of their transportation fuel. I did see where they said that it accounted for 37% of the fuel used in passenger cars, and I believe that was as of 2005. Below that was a fuel consumption chart showing how many liters of diesel, gasoline and ethanol where sold, and if you do the math for 2005 ethanol accounted for better than 18% of sales, and one would think a lot of that diesel and some of that gasoline was burned in other applications besides for transportation purposes. I'd like to know how you came up with your 15% figure.

from the link,

In 2005 the fuel consumed was:
Diesel 35.821 Billion Liters
Gasoline 15.878 Billion Liters
Ethanol 9.376 Billion Liters

Ethanol was 15% of the total volume of fuel used. Since ethanol has a lower energy content it provides even less than 15% for the energy needed for the transportation sector.

Passenger cars is not the only fuel used. Commerical made be fewer vehicles, but consumes a lot of fuel. I suspect passenger car figure also discludes personal light trucks.

If you want to see how Brazil gained their energy independence, I suggest the following links:

Total Oil Supply, All Countries
http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/international/iealf/tableg2.xls

Projected International Oil Production Capacity
http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/ieo/pdf/ieooil.pdf

International Petroleum (Oil) Reserves
http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/international/iealf/crudeoilreserves.xls

Please also note

Despite the overwhelming success of flex cars, they still represent only a very small portion of the {Brazil} national automotive fleet. The National Association of Automobile Manufacturers (ANFAVEA) estimates that flex cars accounted for 7.7% of the national fleet at the end of 2005.

Even with their distribution system and cheap source of sugar cane, the ethanol is still subsidized in Brazil.

In addition to this legacy from the Proalcool program the Government of Brazil (GoB) maintains several programs designed to boost consumption of ethanol. As noted earlier, most ethanol is sold under the GoB’s requirement for a 25% admixture of ethanol to gasoline. In addition, taxes on flex cars are lower than taxes on gasoline powered cars.

The biggest incentives for ethanol, however, are the result of favorable tax treatment at the pump. The GoB assesses significantly higher levies for gasoline than for ethanol under its CIDES and PIS/COFINS programs. The differential in these assessments was estimated by industry contacts at approximately R$ 0.30/liter in October 2005. Moreover, differential treatment under state tax regimes may be even greater. In October of last year, it was estimated that ethanol enjoyed an advantage of approximately R$ 0.50/liter on state assessments in Sao Paulo. As a result, while pump prices were R$1.14/liter for ethanol and R$ 2.22/liter for gasoline, these prices included a differential of R$ 0.80 in taxation rates.