It's bad enough for some propeller planes to be described as being powered by elastic band. Now the skeptics might start having a dig at business airplane flying on whatever from cooking oil to melted algae.
With the civil aviation market under increasing pressure from rising oil rates and ecological legislation, the race is on to find viable alternatives to traditional kerosene and these so far seem to boil down to various kinds of biofuel.
Not remarkably, the first trials of alternative fuel were started by British air travel leader, Sir Richard Branson, whose Virgin Atlantic started 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 regular fuel and bio derivatives consisting of some from made from jatropha which can grow in soil thought about too poor for growing mainstream foods items.
jatropha curcas is a genus of approximately 175 succulent plants, shrubs and trees (some are deciduous, like Jatropha curcas), from the family Euphorbiaceae.
In 2007 Goldman Sachs cited Jatropha curcas as one of the finest candidates for future biodiesel production. It is resistant to dry spell and bugs, and produces seeds containing 27-40% oil.
Recently, US aerospace giant Boeing, aeronautical significant Embraer and the Sao Paulo state Research Support Foundation transferred to perform research study and advancement into using biofuels to power jet airliners. It was reported that Brazilian airlines Azul, Gol, TAM and Trip would function as tactical consultants for the task.
The most current airline to begin explore new fuels is the Alaska Air Group which has actually performed internal US flights using a blend of 80 % petroleum based fuel and 20% biofuel made from cooking oil. This mix, it is declared, can cut damaging emissions by 10%.
One really encouraging advancement has been the move away from biofuels which contend head on with food customers thereby avoiding a rate spiral. Not so long back, a rise in usage of biofuels in vehicles triggered a spike in maize rates as US farmers diverted excessive corn to fuel processing.
Hopefully in the future, airlines and drivers will focus biofuel usage on non-food sources such as jatropha curcas and algae. It would be a blended true blessing indeed if some people ended up starving simply to satisfy another person's green qualifications.
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Airlines Focus On Biofuel Trials Gather Momentum
zorasmith0348 edited this page 2025-01-12 14:46:26 +08:00