It's bad enough for some to be described as being powered by elastic band. Now the cynics might begin having a dig at business airplane flying on everything from cooking oil to melted algae.
With the civil air travel industry under increasing pressure from increasing oil rates and environmental legislation, the race is on to discover feasible options to standard kerosene and these up until now appear to come down to different types of biofuel.
Not remarkably, the very first trials of alternative fuel were started by British aviation leader, Sir Richard Branson, whose Virgin Atlantic started London to Amsterdam flights with limited biofuel use in 2008. This was quickly followed by Lufthansa and Air New Zealand who each utilized various blends of regular fuel and bio derivatives consisting of some from made from jatropha curcas which can grow in soil considered too poor for growing mainstream foods.
jatropha curcas is a genus of roughly 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 very best prospects for future biodiesel production. It is resistant to drought 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 relocated to perform research study and development into the 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 project.
The most current airline company to begin explore new fuels is the Alaska Air Group which has carried out internal US flights using 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 actually encouraging development has actually been the move far from biofuels which complete head on with food customers thus preventing a price spiral. Not so long earlier, a rise in usage of biofuels in cars and trucks caused a spike in maize prices as US farmers diverted too much corn to fuel processing.
Hopefully in the future, airlines and motorists will focus biofuel usage on non-food sources such as jatropha and algae. It would be a combined true blessing indeed if some people wound up starving just to please someone else's green qualifications.
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Airlines Concentrate On Biofuel Trials Gather Momentum
Molly Rooke edited this page 2025-01-18 08:13:36 +08:00