It's bad enough for some prop aircrafts to be explained as being powered by elastic band. Now the cynics might start having a dig at commercial airplane flying on whatever from cooking oil to melted algae.

With the civil aviation market under increasing pressure from increasing oil costs and ecological legislation, the race is on to discover viable options to conventional kerosene and these up until now seem to come down to different kinds of biofuel.

Not remarkably, the very first trials of alternative fuel were started by British air travel 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 different blends of routine fuel and bio derivatives consisting of some from made from jatropha curcas 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 pointed out Jatropha jatropha curcas as one of the very best candidates for future biodiesel production. It is resistant to drought and pests, 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 bring out research and advancement into making use of biofuels to power jet airliners. It was reported that Brazilian airline companies Azul, Gol, TAM and Trip would act as tactical specialists for the project.

The latest airline company to begin exploring with brand-new fuels is the Alaska Air Group which has actually conducted internal US flights utilizing a blend of 80 % petroleum based fuel and 20% biofuel made from cooking oil. This mix, it is claimed, can cut hazardous emissions by 10%.

One truly motivating advancement has actually been the move away from biofuels which compete head on with food consumers therefore avoiding a rate spiral. Not so long back, a rise in usage of in vehicles caused a spike in maize prices as US farmers diverted too much corn to fuel processing.

Hopefully in the future, airlines and vehicle drivers will focus biofuel consumption on non-food sources such as jatropha curcas and algae. It would be a mixed true blessing indeed if some individuals ended up starving just to please somebody else's green qualifications.