It's bad enough for some propeller airplanes to be referred to as being powered by elastic band. Now the cynics might start having a dig at industrial aircraft flying on everything from cooking oil to melted algae.
With the civil air travel industry under increasing pressure from rising oil costs and ecological legislation, the race is on to find practical options to conventional kerosene and these up until now appear to come down to different types of biofuel.
Not surprisingly, the first trials of alternative fuel were initiated by British air travel leader, Sir Richard Branson, whose Virgin Atlantic started London to Amsterdam flights with restricted biofuel usage 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 bad for growing mainstream foodstuffs.
jatropha curcas 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 mentioned Jatropha 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 aerial major Embraer and the Sao Paulo state Research Support Foundation transferred to perform research and development into using biofuels to power jet airliners. It was reported that Brazilian airlines Azul, Gol, TAM and Trip would function as strategic experts for the job.
The most current airline company to start explore brand-new fuels is the Alaska Air Group which has performed internal US flights utilizing a mix of 80 % petroleum based fuel and 20% biofuel made from cooking oil. This mixture, it is declared, can cut harmful emissions by 10%.
One truly encouraging development has actually been the move far from biofuels which complete head on with food consumers therefore avoiding a rate spiral. Not so long earlier, a rise in usage of biofuels in cars caused a spike in maize prices as US farmers diverted excessive corn to fuel processing.
Hopefully in the future, airline companies and vehicle drivers will focus biofuel intake on non-food sources such as jatropha curcas and algae. It would be a blended true blessing undoubtedly if some people ended up starving just to please another person's green qualifications.
