It's bad enough for some prop aircrafts to be referred to as being powered by rubber bands. Now the cynics might begin having a dig at commercial airplane flying on whatever from cooking oil to melted algae.
With the civil air travel industry under increasing pressure from rising oil rates and environmental legislation, the race is on to find feasible alternatives to conventional kerosene and these up until now seem to boil down to various types of biofuel.
Not remarkably, the very first trials of alternative fuel were initiated by British air travel leader, Sir Richard Branson, whose Virgin Atlantic began London to Amsterdam flights with limited biofuel use in 2008. This was rapidly followed by Lufthansa and Air New Zealand who each utilized various blends of routine fuel and bio derivatives including some from made from 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 family Euphorbiaceae.
In 2007 Goldman Sachs pointed out Jatropha curcas as one of the best candidates for future biodiesel production. It is resistant to dry spell and pests, and produces seeds containing 27-40% oil.
Recently, US aerospace giant Boeing, Brazilian aeronautical major 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 most recent airline to begin explore brand-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 damaging emissions by 10%.
One truly motivating advancement has been the move far from biofuels which compete head on with food customers thereby preventing a cost spiral. Not so long earlier, a rise in use of biofuels in cars caused a spike in maize prices as US farmers diverted excessive corn to fuel processing.
Hopefully in the future, airlines and motorists will focus biofuel usage on non-food sources such as jatropha curcas and algae. It would be a mixed true blessing undoubtedly if some people wound up starving simply to please another person's green credentials.
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Airlines Concentrate On Biofuel Trials Gather Momentum
Evie Speer edited this page 3 months ago