It's bad enough for some propeller aircrafts to be explained as being powered by elastic band. Now the skeptics might begin having a dig at business aircraft flying on everything from cooking oil to melted algae.
With the market under increasing pressure from rising oil rates and ecological legislation, the race is on to find feasible alternatives to conventional kerosene and these so far appear to boil down to different kinds of biofuel.
Not remarkably, 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 minimal biofuel use in 2008. This was quickly followed by Lufthansa and Air New Zealand who each used different blends of regular fuel and bio derivatives consisting of some from made from jatropha which can grow in soil thought about too bad for growing mainstream foods items.
Jatropha is a genus of around 175 succulent plants, shrubs and trees (some are deciduous, like Jatropha curcas), from the household Euphorbiaceae.
In 2007 Goldman Sachs pointed out Jatropha curcas as one of the finest 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 transferred to perform research and advancement into using biofuels to power jet airliners. It was reported that Brazilian airlines Azul, Gol, TAM and Trip would act as strategic specialists for the task.
The latest airline to start experimenting with new fuels is the Alaska Air Group which has actually performed internal US flights utilizing 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 actually encouraging development has been the move away from biofuels which compete head on with food consumers thereby avoiding a price spiral. Not so long back, a surge in usage of biofuels in vehicles triggered a spike in maize rates 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 curcas and algae. It would be a blended blessing certainly if some individuals ended up starving simply to please somebody else's green qualifications.
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Airlines Concentrate On Biofuel Trials Gather Momentum
Gertie Bobb edited this page 2025-01-11 13:22:31 +00:00