Airlines Concentrate On Biofuel Trials Gather Momentum

It’s bad enough for some prop planes to be referred to as being powered by rubber bands. Now the cynics might start having a dig at commercial aircraft flying on everything from cooking oil to liquefied algae.

With the civil air travel industry under increasing pressure from rising oil prices and ecological legislation, the race is on to discover practical options to conventional kerosene and these so far appear to boil down to numerous kinds of biofuel.

Not remarkably, the very first trials of alternative fuel were by British aviation pioneer, Sir Richard Branson, whose Virgin Atlantic began London to Amsterdam flights with minimal biofuel usage in 2008. This was rapidly followed by Lufthansa and Air New Zealand who each used different blends of regular fuel and bio derivatives including some from made from jatropha which can grow in soil considered too poor for growing mainstream foods.

jatropha curcas is a genus of approximately 175 succulent plants, shrubs and trees (some are deciduous, like Jatropha curcas), from the household Euphorbiaceae.

In 2007 Goldman Sachs mentioned Jatropha curcas as one of the best candidates for future biodiesel production. It is resistant to dry spell and insects, and produces seeds consisting of 27-40% oil.

Recently, US aerospace giant Boeing, Brazilian aeronautical significant Embraer and the Sao Paulo state Research Support Foundation moved to carry out research and development into using biofuels to power jet airliners. It was reported that Brazilian airline companies Azul, Gol, TAM and Trip would act as tactical experts for the job.

The most recent airline to start explore new fuels is the Alaska Air Group which has conducted internal US flights using a blend of 80 % petroleum based fuel and 20% biofuel made from cooking oil. This mix, it is declared, can cut damaging emissions by 10%.

One really encouraging advancement has actually been the relocation far from biofuels which compete head on with food consumers thereby avoiding a rate spiral. Not so long ago, a surge in usage of biofuels in automobiles triggered a spike in maize rates as US farmers diverted too much corn to fuel processing.

Hopefully in the future, airlines and motorists will focus biofuel consumption on non-food sources such as jatropha and algae. It would be a blended true blessing undoubtedly if some individuals ended up starving just to please somebody else’s green credentials.