1 Jatropha a Viable Alternative Renewable Resource
Ariel Ehrlichmann edited this page 2025-01-11 21:20:40 +01:00


Constantly the biodiesel industry is trying to find some alternative to produce sustainable energy. Biodiesel prepared from canola, sunflower and jatropha can change or be combined with conventional diesel. During first half of 2000's jatropha curcas biofuel made the headlines as a popular and appealing option. It is prepared from jatropha curcas, a plant types belonging to Central America that can be grown on wasteland.

Jatropha Curcas is a non edible plant that grows in the deserts. The plant grows extremely rapidly and it can yield seeds for about 50 years. The oil received from its seeds can be used as a biofuel. This can be blended with petroleum diesel. Previously it has actually been used twice with algae mix to sustain test flight of airlines.

Another favorable approach of jatorpha seeds is that they have 37% oil material and they can be burned as a fuel without improving them. It is also used for medical purpose. Supporters of jatropha biodiesel say that the flames of jatropha oil are smoke free and they are successfully checked for easy diesel motor.

Jatropha biodiesel as Renewable Energy Investment has actually drawn in the interest of many business, which have actually evaluated it for vehicle usage. Jatropha biodiesel has been road tested by Mercedes and 3 of the cars have actually covered 18,600 miles by using the jatropha plant biodiesel.

Since it is because of some disadvantages, the jatropha biodiesel have ruled out as a fantastic renewable energy. The greatest problem is that no one understands that just what the efficiency rate of the plant is. Secondly they do not understand how large scale growing may affect the soil quality and the environment as a whole. The jatropha plant needs five times more water per energy than corn and sugarcane. This raises another concern. On the other hand it is to be noted that jatropha can grow on tropical environments with annual rainfall of about 1000 to 1500 mm. A thing to be kept in mind is that jatropha requires correct watering in the first year of its plantation which lasts for decades.

Recent study says that it holds true that jatropha curcas can grow on degraded land with little water and poor nutrition. But there is no proof for the yield to be high. This may be proportional to the quality of the soil. In such a case it may need high quality of land and may need the exact same quagmire that is dealt with by most biofuel types.

jatropha curcas has one main drawback. The seeds and leaves of jatropha are harmful to human beings and livestock. This made the Australian federal government to ban the plant in 2006. The declared the plant as intrusive types, and too risky for western Australian farming and the environment here (DAFWQ 2006).

While jatropha has promoting budding, there are number of research difficulties stay. The value of cleansing has to be studied since of the toxicity of the plant. Along side an organized research study of the oil yield have actually to be carried out, this is very crucial since of high yield of jatropha would most likely needed before jatropha can be contributed considerably to the world. Lastly it is also very crucial to study about the jatropha species that can survive in more temperature environment, as jatropha is quite limited in the tropical environments.