It's bad enough for some propeller aircrafts to be explained as being powered by rubber bands. Now the skeptics might start having a dig at industrial airplane flying on whatever from cooking oil to liquefied algae.

With the civil aviation industry under increasing pressure from increasing oil prices and environmental legislation, the race is on to find viable options to traditional kerosene and these up until now seem to boil down to various kinds of biofuel.

Not remarkably, the very first trials of alternative fuel were started by British aviation pioneer, Sir Richard Branson, whose Virgin Atlantic began London to Amsterdam flights with restricted biofuel use in 2008. This was quickly followed by Lufthansa and Air New Zealand who each utilized different blends of regular fuel and bio derivatives including some from made from jatropha which can grow in soil considered too bad for growing mainstream foodstuffs.

Jatropha 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 very best 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, Brazilian aeronautical major Embraer and the Sao Paulo state Research Support Foundation moved to carry out research study and development 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 latest airline company to start explore brand-new fuels is the Alaska Air Group which has actually conducted internal US flights utilizing a blend of 80 % fuel and 20% biofuel made from cooking oil. This mixture, it is claimed, can cut hazardous emissions by 10%.

One really encouraging advancement has actually been the relocation away from biofuels which contend head on with food consumers consequently avoiding a rate spiral. Not so long earlier, a surge in usage of biofuels in cars triggered a spike in maize prices as US farmers diverted too much corn to fuel processing.

Hopefully in the future, airline companies and motorists will focus biofuel intake on non-food sources such as jatropha and algae. It would be a combined true blessing undoubtedly if some individuals ended up starving just to please another person's green credentials.