Airlines Focus On Biofuel Trials Gather Momentum
It’s bad enough for some prop aircrafts to be referred to as being powered by rubber bands. Now the skeptics could start having a dig at commercial aircraft flying on everything from cooking oil to melted algae.
With the civil air travel industry under increasing pressure from rising oil prices and environmental legislation, the race is on to discover feasible options to conventional kerosene and these up until now appear to come down to different types of biofuel.
Not surprisingly, the very first trials of alternative fuel were started by British air travel leader, Sir Richard Branson, whose Virgin Atlantic started London to Amsterdam flights with limited biofuel use in 2008. This was rapidly followed by Lufthansa and Air New Zealand who each used various blends of routine fuel and bio derivatives including some from made from jatropha which can grow in soil thought about too poor for growing mainstream foods.
Jatropha is a genus of roughly 175 succulent plants, shrubs and trees (some are deciduous, like Jatropha curcas), from the family Euphorbiaceae.
In 2007 Goldman Sachs cited Jatropha curcas as one of the very best prospects for future biodiesel production. It is resistant to dry spell and bugs, and produces seeds including 27-40% oil.
Recently, US aerospace giant Boeing, Brazilian aeronautical significant Embraer and the Sao Paulo state Research Support Foundation relocated to bring out research study and advancement into the usage of biofuels to power jet airliners. It was reported that Brazilian airline Azul, Gol, TAM and Trip would serve as tactical experts for the task.
The most recent airline to begin experimenting with new fuels is the Alaska Air Group which has performed internal US flights using a blend of 80 % petroleum based fuel and 20% biofuel made from cooking oil. This mixture, it is declared, can cut hazardous emissions by 10%.
One truly motivating advancement has actually been the move far from biofuels which compete head on with food consumers thereby preventing a rate spiral. Not so long earlier, a rise in usage of biofuels in cars and trucks caused a spike in maize costs as US farmers diverted excessive corn to fuel processing.
Hopefully in the future, airlines and motorists will focus biofuel usage on non-food sources such as jatropha and algae. It would be a combined true blessing undoubtedly if some individuals wound up starving simply to satisfy another person’s green credentials.