"On December 3, a Boeing 747 belonging to Air New Zealand is scheduled to take off from Auckland, New Zealand, powered in part by a new type of jet fuel made from a weed. A mixture of equal parts biofuel and conventional fuel will run one of the plane's engines ... jatropha oil, unlike petroleum, contains oxygen. To make the oil into a hydrocarbon compatible with existing refining strategies, UOP included a step to add hydrogen gas, which removes the oxygen. (Other biofuels, such as biodiesel, don't take this step, which affects the performance of the fuel and can require changes to engines.) The resulting hydrocarbon molecules are then broken into shorter molecules through a common refining process called hydrocracking. During this process, the linear molecules are modified so that they have "kinks in the chain," says Jennifer Holmgren, the general manager of UOP's renewable-energy unit. That makes the resulting fuel less susceptible to freezing. The process produces a mixture of primarily jet fuel and diesel fuel.
Unlike many other biofuels, UOP's jatropha jet fuel can replace conventional fuel without requiring changes to existing engines. Indeed, by several measures, the fuel is better than conventional jet fuel. It has a lower freezing point and can be exposed to higher temperatures onboard a plane without degrading. It also contains slightly more energy than conventional jet fuel, so a plane powered by jatropha could travel farther. "
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- phillyphil
- added this
- added November 21, 2008
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weeds are just plants that are really good at growing....
is this a new development or just another bad step in the biofuels game?
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- phillyphil
- 8 months ago
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It's a bad step... Hemp is much more sustainable as a resource crop.
Honestly though, they already have hydrogen fueled jets in the works that can fly at supersonic speeds.
If they can fly that fast, why not conventional jets powered by hydrogen? We can produce plenty of fuel using clean sources such as solar and wind power, creating a literally emission free fuel.
For cars I think we should use methanol, a fuel created by fermenting any woody biomass (ie: corn or hemp stalks NOT FOOD!) It is a bio fuel, but not in the sense that anyone has to go hungry or pay more for food because of it.
For our diesels we need natural gas. T Boon Pickens is backing this move as well as supporting and financing solar and wind power.
We can clean up our act, we have the technologies!
