It's bad enough for some prop planes to be described as being powered by elastic band. Now the skeptics could begin having a dig at business airplane flying on everything 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 discover practical options to conventional kerosene and these up until now appear to boil down to different kinds of biofuel.
Not remarkably, the first trials of alternative fuel were started by British air travel pioneer, Sir Richard Branson, whose Virgin Atlantic began London to Amsterdam flights with restricted biofuel use in 2008. This was rapidly followed by Lufthansa and Air New Zealand who each used various blends of routine fuel and bio derivatives consisting of some from made from jatropha which can grow in soil thought about too bad for growing mainstream foods.
jatropha curcas 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 finest 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 aerial major Embraer and the Sao Paulo state Research Support Foundation relocated to perform research 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 experts for the project.
The newest airline company to begin with new fuels is the Alaska Air Group which has actually carried out internal US flights using a blend 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 motivating advancement has been the relocation away from biofuels which contend head on with food customers therefore preventing a rate spiral. Not so long back, a surge in use of biofuels in cars and trucks caused a spike in maize costs as US farmers diverted too much corn to fuel processing.
Hopefully in the future, airlines and drivers will focus biofuel intake on non-food sources such as jatropha and algae. It would be a combined true blessing indeed if some individuals wound up starving just to please another person's green credentials.
1
Airlines Focus On Biofuel Trials Gather Momentum
deliasneddon5 edited this page 1 month ago