Airlines Focus On Biofuel Trials Gather Momentum

It’s bad enough for some propeller aircrafts to be referred to as being powered by rubber bands. Now the skeptics might start having a dig at industrial aircraft flying on everything from cooking oil to melted algae.

With the civil aviation industry under increasing pressure from rising oil prices and ecological legislation, the race is on to discover viable options to standard kerosene and these up until now seem to boil down to numerous types of biofuel.

Not surprisingly, the first trials of alternative fuel were started by British aviation leader, 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 various blends of regular fuel and bio derivatives consisting of some from made from jatropha curcas which can grow in soil thought about too bad for growing mainstream foods.

Jatropha is a genus of approximately 175 succulent plants, shrubs and trees (some are deciduous, like Jatropha jatropha curcas), from the family Euphorbiaceae.

In 2007 Goldman Sachs mentioned as one of the best prospects for future biodiesel production. It is resistant to drought and insects, and produces seeds containing 27-40% oil.

Recently, US aerospace giant Boeing, Brazilian aeronautical significant Embraer and the Sao Paulo state Research Support Foundation moved to carry out research study and development into making use of biofuels to power jet airliners. It was reported that Brazilian airlines Azul, Gol, TAM and Trip would serve as strategic experts for the task.

The newest airline 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 mix, it is claimed, can cut harmful emissions by 10%.

One actually motivating development has actually been the move far from biofuels which compete head on with food customers thus avoiding a rate spiral. Not so long ago, a surge in use of biofuels in automobiles triggered a spike in maize prices as US farmers diverted too much corn to fuel processing.

Hopefully in the future, airline companies and drivers will focus biofuel intake on non-food sources such as jatropha and algae. It would be a blended blessing certainly if some people wound up starving simply to satisfy someone else’s green credentials.