Airlines Focus On Biofuel Trials Gather Momentum

It’s bad enough for some to be referred to as being powered by rubber bands. Now the skeptics could begin having a dig at business aircraft flying on whatever from cooking oil to melted algae.

With the civil aviation industry under increasing pressure from increasing oil prices and ecological legislation, the race is on to find feasible options to conventional kerosene and these up until now seem to come down to numerous types of biofuel.

Not surprisingly, the first trials of alternative fuel were initiated by British air travel pioneer, Sir Richard Branson, whose Virgin Atlantic started London to Amsterdam flights with limited 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 including some from made from jatropha which can grow in soil thought about too poor for growing mainstream foods items.

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 best candidates for future biodiesel production. It is resistant to dry spell and pests, 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 bring out research study and development into making use of biofuels to power jet airliners. It was reported that Brazilian airline companies Azul, Gol, TAM and Trip would function as tactical experts for the project.

The most recent airline company to begin experimenting with new fuels is the Alaska Air Group which has actually performed 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 damaging emissions by 10%.

One actually motivating development has been the move far from biofuels which contend head on with food consumers consequently preventing a cost spiral. Not so long ago, a rise in use of biofuels in automobiles caused a spike in maize rates as US farmers diverted excessive corn to fuel processing.

Hopefully in the future, airline companies and vehicle drivers will focus biofuel consumption on non-food sources such as jatropha and algae. It would be a combined blessing indeed if some individuals wound up starving just to satisfy somebody else’s green credentials.