Jatropha A Feasible Alternative Renewable Resource

Constantly the biodiesel industry is searching for some alternative to produce renewable resource. Biodiesel prepared from canola, sunflower and jatropha can change or be integrated with traditional diesel. During first half of 2000’s jatropha biofuel made the headlines as a preferred and promising alternative. It is prepared from jatropha curcas, a plant species native 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 obtained from its seeds can be utilized as a biofuel. This can be mixed with petroleum diesel. Previously it has been utilized twice with algae combination to fuel test flight of commercial airline companies.

Another positive method 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 function. Supporters of jatropha biodiesel state that the flames of jatropha oil are smoke free and they are successfully tested for easy diesel motor.

Jatropha biodiesel as Renewable resource Investment has drawn in the interest of numerous companies, which have tested it for vehicle use. Jatropha biodiesel has been road checked by Mercedes and 3 of the cars have actually covered 18,600 miles by utilizing the jatropha plant biodiesel.

Since it is because of some disadvantages, the jatropha biodiesel have actually not considered as a fantastic eco-friendly energy. The biggest issue is that no one knows that exactly what the performance rate of the plant is. Secondly they don’t know how large scale growing may affect the soil quality and the environment as a whole. The jatropha plant needs 5 times more water per energy than corn and sugarcane. This raises another concern. On the other hand it is to be kept in mind that jatropha can grow on tropical climates with annual rains of about 1000 to 1500 mm. A thing to be kept in mind is that jatropha needs correct irrigation in the very first year of its plantation which lasts for years.

Recent study says that it is real that jatropha can grow on degraded land with little water and poor nutrition. But there is no evidence 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 same quagmire that is dealt with by most biofuel types.

Jatropha has one primary downside. The seeds and leaves of jatropha are hazardous to human beings and livestock. This made the Australian federal government to prohibit the plant in 2006. The federal government stated the plant as intrusive types, and too risky for western Australian agriculture and the environment here (DAFWQ 2006).

While jatropha has stimulating budding, there are variety of research challenges remain. The importance of detoxification has to be studied because of the toxicity of the plant. Along side an organized study of the oil yield have to be undertaken, this is extremely essential due to the fact that of high yield of jatropha would most likely required before jatropha can be contributed substantially to the world. Lastly it is also to study about the jatropha species that can survive in more temperature climate, as jatropha is extremely much restricted in the tropical climates.