JATROPHA OIL: Is The Jatropha Seed A Miracle Biodiesel Alternative?

The jatropha tree, a fruit-bearing plant native to South America, may offer the next big fuel alternative. The fruit's seeds produce oil, which can be used in standard diesel engines. Chrysler, Air New Zealand and Hindustan Petroleum have initiated jatropha biodiesel production. Air New Zealand will host a test flight run on jatropha biofuel in November.

Although each tree yields only one gallon of oil per year, scientists hope to increase the amount of fruit per tree and the percentage of oil from each seed. While China, Africa, Brazil and India have already planted millions of acres of jatropha trees, the United States is slowly investing in the plant.

Watch CNN's video on the jatropha fruit as a dream fuel.

Related:

::Read about the 5 things you didn't know were biofuels on the Huffington Post.
::Read more at the Huffington Post Green Energy big news page.

Comments

[ZimboChick]

You ding dongs Africa is not a country! I know Zimbabwe is growing the tree but who else in Africa is doing it. You list Brazil, etc and then Africa????/ Like seriously?

[SCG2]

" Shell, Biopetroleum to Build Algae Plant to Make Fuel "
By Eduard Gismatullin and Marianne Stigset - Bloomberg


Dec. 11 (Bloomberg) -- Royal Dutch Shell Plc, Europe's largest oil company, and HR Biopetroleum will build an algae- growing plant in Hawaii to produce vegetable oil for biofuels.

The two companies have set up a joint venture, Cellana, to develop the project and will start by constructing a pilot facility, Shell said today in a statement. The partners say algae will absorb carbon dioxide, a gas blamed for global warming.

Algae ``can double their mass several times a day and produce at least 15 times more oil per hectare than alternatives such as rape, palm soya or jatropha,'' Shell said. It ``can be cultivated in ponds of seawater, minimizing the use of fertile land and fresh water.''

continues: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601102&sid=ahSsmDmNPDXk&refer=uk

[jsarets]

A tree!?!

The key to biofuels is seeking the lowest attainable level of biological overhead that isn't a part of the enzymatic pathways we're trying to exploit. This means that grasses are more efficient than trees, algae more efficient than grasses, and bacteria more efficient than any natural life form in our known biosphere. Carbohydrate and/or alcohol production will be more efficient than lipid production.

Any introductory biology student should understand the basic mechanics of these metabolic processes. The slower, more sophisticated, less efficient metabolisms of higher life forms evolved through resource competition with other species. But domestication largely eliminates the need for survival traits. When we can control the environment, simple organisms are ideal.

I image serpentine clear plastic tubes circulating a geneticall­y-modified species of cyanobacteria in a carbonated water solution, absorbing sunlight through the tubing to process the carbonated water into alcohol. At the end of the loop, the alcohol solution is distilled with an (at least partially) alcohol-fueled boiler, the CO2 emissions of which are used to carbonate the fresh bacteria solution at the beginning of the loop.

[ImmanuelGoldstein]

Algae circulating through plastic tubes is a science fair project.
You cannot get more energy from a given area using photosynthesis than the solar flux of that area, that's simple logic.
Even if you could breed a science fiction algae 10x better than any existing green plant (maybe if we chant the magic word 'nanotechnology' enough that'll happen....) you will still need an area the size of a state to harvest enough solar energy through this method to make a dent in our liquid fuels budget. (that is 'make a dent' not REPLACE).
EXISTING solar cells have a conversion efficiency twice that already.
This means gigantic open air algae ponds with all the insurmountable problems that presents.
You can now return to your regularly scheduled fantasy.

[jsarets]

First, I'm talking about bacteria, not algae. Bacteria could eventually compete with thin-film and CIGS PV on an areal basis, none of which could harness more energy than the solar flux either, as you know.

But the biggest advantage of biotic photosynthesis is carbon fixation via the Calvin cycle. Bacterial cells can suck CO2 out of the atmosphere, PV cells can't. While they convert solar energy into chemical energy, they are also counteracting humanity's impact on the atmospheric carbon/oxygen balance.

[preatorius]

bad idea. We alternatives to combustion engines
The automaker shoudld stop being so lazy and try to catch up with japan

[RJII]

whoa "killthemessenger." you're all over this post. do you work for in the solar industry?

[KillTheMessenger]

No. I don't. But I hate nonsense. And people mistaking green leaves for green solutions is just that. The world of energy is more complicated than that of spring color matching. We need to educate people that the decisions they make and the choices they have all have to be based on hard core science principles or we will end up with more expensive quagmires like corn ethanol.

[twgbonehead]

KTM, I agree with a lot of what you say. There are a lot of boondoggles out there, and this particular article is just one more in a long, long series of "miracles" that ain't.

I DO disagree with your premise that photovoltaics are "THE" solution. They are promising, but still very expensive :

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1830386,00.html

And there's just as much hype - "Printable" PV shingles, that were supposed to be in production last fall, that cost only 10% more than conventional shingles, for example.

I do think that algae has a tremendous potential, and it's worth the investment to find out exactly what we can do with it - supplying energy and food products, remediating CO2, environmental cleanup, helping to restore fish populations, etc. (If agribusiness didn't have a say in it, I think high-fructose corn syrup would be a product of the past within the next 10 years, totally replaced by algae-produced sugar products).

(Then again, I also think that cold, or "tabletop" fusion is also worth revisiting. It's a long shot, but it's got better odds than that mega-millions ticket I bought a few months ago!)

[handyallen1]

i agree alcohol is for drinking not burning hummmmm bourbon, not fuel, solar and wind is the way to go

[sustainable]

maybe the problem is that there isn't a single solution.

[ImmanuelGoldstein]

This has the same problem that all biofuels ultimately have, the poor conversion efficiency of photosythetic plants.

Typically for a field of plants this is in the range of 0.5%-1% very poor compared with solar panels.

The big problem of course is the belief that we will run a society that looks anything like ours using biofuels. Not with the highly dispersed nature of this kind of energy and our intensive use of it. It will take an area the size of a small STATE to power our society with biofuels. Thats with every arable square inch devoted to biofuel. And where will THAT take food prices?

[KillTheMessenger]

It would take several times the total land area of the US to power our energy needs with biofuels. It will take a small state to power us with solar energy.

The good news is that we have plenty of area available on rooftops, over parking lots etc. to get started. We won't be running out of good places for solar panels for decades.

[soulfulnotes]

And the sun is free.

[twgbonehead]

From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photovoltaic_cell

"The photovoltaic effect was first recognized in 1839 by French physicist A. E. Becquerel. However, it was not until 1883 that the first solar cell was built, ... Russell Ohl patented the modern solar cell in 1946 (U.S. Patent 2,402,662 , "Light sensitive device")"

And yet, despite continual technical development (extensive since the '50's) photovoltaics have had a negative EROI until very recently, and an even worse $ROI. Large-scale Algae production hasn't even been on the radar screens until this decade.

While you can synthesize liquid fuels using electricity, you just flushed that 10X down the tubes.

The "Several times the total land area" is total B.S. (And unlike algae, solar cells don't replicate themselves every couple of days or so).

Not to mention that algae can be grown in the oceans (which, last I heard, actually DO cover several times the acreage of all land masses combined) and is carbon-negative, rather than solar cells which are at BEST carbon-neutral. Algae can also be used for food and feed production, sewage processing and other environmental cleanup tasks, unlike solar cells.

[JScott]

And so is this really a solution? How many other crops would be displaced to grow it or how much rain forest would have to disappear to grow it , and how much additional ag resoures as well as water and the associated complicated plumbing needed to irrigate it.

[verhaftik]

I completely agree. Yet another idiotic attempt as we groan toward the vital inevitable: clean energies (solar, wind).

Do we have collective Alzheimers? Do we have a memory span of a goldfish? What about global warming aren't we understanding here? Biofuels (which are fuels from anything grown or refined on earth - from plants, oils, whatever) leads to CO2 and thus global warming. (Need we even discuss the disaster that is nuclear energy / waste? Nyet.)

Enough of these frivolous bandaids. Make the leap America. Stop dumping resources into research on this garbage. We don't have that luxury any more (our kids and grandkids certainly don't).

[CrzyRussell]

Wind and solar are only a piece of the energy pie. We will still need to use oil/gas/nuclear probably forever as our country grows. Plus we will need oil for tires, roads, lubricants and plastics.

[DallasMike]

Did you know that when animals and humans exhale the exhale CO2?
So are we just suppose to stop breathing?

[funkalicious]

1 gallon per tree I burn 30 or 40 trees a week plus heat and electricity another 40 so maybe burning 80 trees a week times ten square feet per tree plus nitrogen soil amendments. It seems to me that we will not be burning this in cars any day soon at least not in a sustainable fashion.

Algae reproduces much faster and has way more potential to be grown in a vertical environments can be used to scrub smoke stacks. Way more yield per pound. Doesn't take up valuable food soils and nitrogen rich fertilizers. and can be grown in harsh environments.

My research money would bet soil less algae engineered to produce oil . Oil is a natural by product of Algae anyway.

[KillTheMessenger]

If you use algae to scrub a smoke stack, why burn anything in the first place at a thermodynamic efficiency of 60%, at best?

Why don't you just set up solar panels and replace the entire Rube Goldberg machine of algae burning plant and algae scrubber with something that actually works?

[sustainable]

That is a good point, perhaps we should stop thinking that we will find a single replacement for fossil fuels and start combining different options to achieve the same result. Certainly in the short term.

[OilCrash]

Here is a company that is working with Jatropha, http://www.medicaldiscoveries.com/

[Wilburrr]

.....and the potential yield per acre is???

[KillTheMessenger]

Too low.

[LeftLeanWing]

What about the potential of using algae as a biofuel? I've heard that it has a lot of potential because it's high-yield and easy to grow.

[KillTheMessenger]

To hear stuff is not enough. You have to see it in action. And so far every experiment to make algae economically feasible for anything else than green juice production, you know, eight bucks a jug at your local organic store.

I would put it in the "technology of the future" category. The kind that will always stay in the future, that is.

[darthdarcy]

HEMP the easiest way to go, and the number 1 bio mass plant of Earth..

It renews every 4 months, and we can get bio diesel from the seeds and cellulose ethanol from the stalks..!

Industrial Hemp...!

[GreyFlcn]

Or not.
http://greyfalcon.net/hemp.png

[limacon]

Have you heard of an electric car?

[KillTheMessenger]

Is it a miracle plant?

No, it's not.

One acre of solar cells can make energy worth ten acres of Jathropa which can be used at twice the efficiency of the best diesel engine we can put into cars.

People need to understand that making hydrocarbons from water and CO2 is an expensive undertaking and nature is doing it very inefficiently. Just because it's green does not make it "green". In order for a solar technology to be "green", it has to look pitch black, like any good solar cell.

[jay1975]

What cars are readily available that run on solar? This is about fuel not powering your home.

[KillTheMessenger]

How much biofuel can be made available by farming? Not nearly enough. So you are contrasting a solution that does not exist with one that does not work. The solution that does not exist is technically feasible and will be available when needed. Plug in hybrids and electric vehicles are under development and will be available in production quantities past 2010. OTOH, you cal look at plants as long as you like and they still can't produce the amount of energy we need. Not in 2010, not in 2020, not in 2050.

Of course, we will be able to manufacture some sort of black goo flowing through glass or plastic pipes that can be biochemically much more efficient than plants. It just won't be any different than solar panels in the way it will be utilized.

On solution people forget about in this technically undereducated discussion is this:

Take a plant, burn it root, stem and leaves, seeds and all in an oven, generate steam and drive a steam turbine as in a conventional power plant and what do you get? A MUCH more efficient way of making energy than all this oil seed stuff. Still not nearly as good per area as solar panels, but much better than the biofuel craze that has everyone waiting for the magic green bullet.

[sustainable]

Yes but what the amount of oil which goes into the manufacture of a solar panel? Sure once they are made they are nice and green, but what about the manufacturing process and materials used?

The cost of even 1 solar panel (which at best can charge the odd garden ornament) is out of reach for many - an acre acre of them would be way expensive and thats before the security measures you would have to put in place to keep them there.

What about the storage of electric power? Capacitors would be great but they are some way off yet, so what happens to the batteries after their usefulness, and what impact do all their toxic elements have on the environment?

This plant kicks the electric option to the curb for agricultural and aviation applications.

[KillTheMessenger]

EROEI on solar panels is 10 or more. On plants... probably 1...5.

That's another loser argument. Look up the real cost of farming and then the question evaporates.

The cost of planting 10 acres of anything is just as well out of reach for most. Unless you happen to be a farmer and do it for a living, you will not have 10 acres of farmland sitting around: one acre to feed yourself and your family and nine acres to feed your car.

The cost for solar energy is coming down exponentially (look at the price history) and currently it is about the same as the cost of oil (and it's already cheaper than gasoline).

So that argument goes nowhere, either. If you can afford to drive, you can afford solar energy. You just don't realize it.

[RRK70]

The future is going to require multiple solutions to take the place of petroleum. You make some very good points about electric and PV. On the other hand, I would like to see how a jet airplane is going to fly with an electric motor and batteries.

So, no, it's not a miracle plant, but will it play a role either as a transitional fuel or fuel for a niche market, yes.

[KillTheMessenger]

Since you can make the same amount of energy on one tenth of the area with physical methods than you can with plants, you can synthesize your way up the chemical chain from e.g. hydrogen with conventional methods from organic chemistry. We use the particular kinds of molecules we find in oil because they are already there, not because they are the optimum for jet powered flight.

And I wouldn't worry about oil not being available for flight for the next century, or so. The problem is not flying, it's driving oversized manhood extenders and shipping containers over continental distances on rubber wheels rather than steel rails.

[jay1975]

Thank you, I have been racking my brain trying to remeber the name of this tree. I saw a special on it in the news two months ago and wanted to look it up.