It's bad enough for some propeller airplanes to be explained as being powered by elastic band. Now the skeptics could begin having a dig at commercial aircraft flying on whatever 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 come down to various kinds of biofuel.

Not surprisingly, 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 minimal biofuel usage in 2008. This was quickly followed by Lufthansa and Air New Zealand who each used various blends of routine fuel and bio derivatives including some from made from jatropha which can grow in soil considered too bad for growing mainstream .

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 mentioned 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 relocated to bring out research and development into using 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 newest airline to begin try out brand-new fuels is the Alaska Air Group which has performed internal US flights utilizing a blend of 80 % petroleum based fuel and 20% biofuel made from cooking oil. This mixture, it is declared, can cut hazardous emissions by 10%.

One actually encouraging development has actually been the relocation away from biofuels which compete head on with food consumers therefore avoiding a price spiral. Not so long back, a rise in usage of biofuels in automobiles triggered a spike in maize costs as US farmers diverted excessive corn to fuel processing.

Hopefully in the future, airlines and motorists will focus biofuel intake on non-food sources such as jatropha and algae. It would be a combined blessing undoubtedly if some individuals wound up starving simply to satisfy somebody else's green qualifications.