Airlines Focus On Biofuel Trials Gather Momentum

It’s bad enough for some prop planes to be explained as being powered by elastic band. Now the might start having a dig at business airplane flying on whatever from cooking oil to melted algae.

With the civil aviation market under increasing pressure from increasing oil prices and environmental legislation, the race is on to discover practical options to traditional kerosene and these so far appear to boil down to various kinds of biofuel.

Not remarkably, the first trials of alternative fuel were started by British air travel leader, Sir Richard Branson, whose Virgin Atlantic began London to Amsterdam flights with restricted biofuel use in 2008. This was quickly followed by Lufthansa and Air New Zealand who each used various blends of routine fuel and bio derivatives consisting of some from made from jatropha which can grow in soil thought about too poor for growing mainstream foods.

Jatropha is a genus of approximately 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 finest prospects for future biodiesel production. It is resistant to dry spell and pests, and produces seeds containing 27-40% oil.

Recently, US aerospace giant Boeing, Brazilian aeronautical major Embraer and the Sao Paulo state Research Support Foundation moved to carry out research study and development into using biofuels to power jet airliners. It was reported that Brazilian airline companies Azul, Gol, TAM and Trip would serve as strategic specialists for the project.

The current airline company to start explore brand-new fuels is the Alaska Air Group which has actually conducted internal US flights using a blend of 80 % petroleum based fuel and 20% biofuel made from cooking oil. This mixture, it is claimed, can cut hazardous emissions by 10%.

One truly motivating development has actually been the relocation far from biofuels which complete head on with food customers thus preventing a cost spiral. Not so long ago, a surge in use of biofuels in cars and trucks caused a spike in maize costs as US farmers diverted too much corn to fuel processing.

Hopefully in the future, airlines and vehicle drivers will focus biofuel usage on non-food sources such as jatropha and algae. It would be a mixed blessing undoubtedly if some individuals ended up starving just to satisfy somebody else’s green qualifications.