It's bad enough for some prop airplanes to be referred to as being powered by rubber bands. Now the skeptics might start having a dig at industrial aircraft flying on whatever from cooking oil to liquefied algae.
With the civil air travel industry under increasing pressure from rising oil costs and environmental legislation, the race is on to find viable alternatives to standard kerosene and these up until now appear to come down to numerous kinds of biofuel.
Not remarkably, the very first trials of alternative fuel were initiated by British air travel pioneer, Sir Richard Branson, whose Virgin Atlantic began London to Amsterdam flights with restricted biofuel usage in 2008. This was quickly followed by Lufthansa and Air New Zealand who each utilized different blends of routine fuel and bio derivatives including some from made from jatropha curcas which can grow in soil considered too poor for growing mainstream foods items.
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 cited Jatropha curcas as one of the very best prospects for future biodiesel production. It is resistant to dry spell and insects, and produces seeds including 27-40% oil.
Recently, US aerospace giant Boeing, Brazilian aeronautical major Embraer and the Sao Paulo state Research Support Foundation moved to bring out research study and advancement into making use of biofuels to power jet airliners. It was reported that Brazilian airlines Azul, Gol, TAM and Trip would serve as tactical consultants for the task.
The current airline company to begin try out brand-new fuels is the Alaska Air Group which has actually carried out internal US flights utilizing a blend of 80 % petroleum based fuel and 20% biofuel made from cooking oil. This mixture, it is declared, can cut hazardous emissions by 10%.
One truly encouraging development has actually been the relocation far from biofuels which contend head on with food consumers thus preventing a rate spiral. Not so long ago, a rise in usage 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 drivers will focus biofuel usage on non-food sources such as jatropha and algae. It would be a blended blessing certainly if some people wound up starving just to satisfy another person's green credentials.
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Airlines Focus On Biofuel Trials Gather Momentum
Janis Fine edited this page 6 days ago