What plants might be grown, just for bio-fuel?

[Rev]

i should have added a caveat

 

my comments are meant for Australasia

 

Aust mainland, Tassie, PNG and east of the wallace line

 

outside of that - take your own chances

[Michaelangelica]

Vetiver?

Wouldn't it be more root than anything else and difficult to harvest?

What is the Wallace line pls?

 

Biodiesel could reduce greenhouse gas emissions

Submitted by News Account on 27 November 2007

“The results of this study show biodiesel has the potential to reduce emissions from the transport industry, which is the third largest producer of greenhouse gases in Australia, behind stationary energy generation and agriculture,” Dr Beer said.

 

“The greenhouse gas savings do however depend on the feedstock used to produce the biodiesel. The highest savings are obtained by replacing base diesel with biodiesel from used cooking oil, resulting in an 87 per cent emission reduction.”

 

“Palm oil can produce up to an 80 per cent saving in emissions provided it is sourced from pre-1990 plantations. The palm oil source is critical as product from plantations established on recently dried peat swamps or cleared tropical forest will in fact have higher greenhouse gas emissions than regular diesel due to factors such as land clearing.”

 

The use of biodiesel also reduces the particulate matter released into the atmosphere as a result of burning fuels, providing potential benefits to human health.

Biodiesel could reduce greenhouse gas emissions | Scientific Blogging

[diazotrophicus]

Hi Rev,

 

Jatropha is very useful, I have kept contact with Reinhard Henning of jatropha.de (English) for more than ten years now, and those wind breaks or live fences in Mali really are taking off. They now have 17 thousand kilometers of it. And each meter produces about one liter of oil per year. Go figure. That makes seventeen million liters, over four million gallons of oil, straight for the Listeroid field master.

 

But for agroforestry: the beneficial effect seems to be the synergy of nitrogen fixation, wind break, goat repellent, root growth factors and soil cover, aka living mulch.

 

And char in the soil works as a wick and storage medium for anything mobile, including water.

diazotrophicus

 

Hi,

from my list of bookmarks some sites of interest showing plants and systems for soil improvement and biofuel production.

 

From Thailand some encouraging pictures about Sesbania rostrata, the world champion in nitrogen fixation (with Azorhizobium caulinodans living on the stem of Sesbania)

Pictures of the Systems

 

The amount of biomass is astounding, grows very fast in humid climate. If some of that biomass is turned into char and worked into the soll, as shown in the pics, you have the best of two worlds.

Also Azolla would be a fast growing source of biomass, fixing nitrogen on the way.

Role of green manure crops in lowland rice based farming system of northern Thailand

 

In the USA the land institute with Wes Jackson has good experience with native perennials

The Land Institute - Illinois Bundleflower: Prospects For A Perennial Seed Crop

 

And from Tasmania some encouraging report on getting more with less input

Farming for Fertility part 3

 

Spread the information, it is the only thing we have to distinguish us from our stone age ancestors.

diazotrophicus

[Michaelangelica]

Marine algae get the green light from Shell

 

* 20 December 2007

* From New Scientist Print Edition

Shell plans to begin construction on a pilot plant in Hawaii immediately, which it expects will produce 15 times as much oil for a given area as other biofuel crops, thanks to the efficiency of algal photosynthesis.

Marine algae get the green light from Shell - earth - 20 December 2007 - New Scientist Environment

Like many technologies/(plants?) this has been around for a while but is being dusted off now as the price of oil has risen.

Gopher weed also should be economic by now?

[Monomer]

Perhaps more Cacao trees should be grown...

 

Chocolate is a guilty pleasure for some, but could soon prove highly nutritious — for your car! Thanks to a process created by British company Ecotec, it is now possible to take waste chocolate from confectionery companies and turn it into biodiesel. And to prove that it works, two British adventurers just completed a trek on a chocolate powered truck that went all the way from Europe to Timbuktu!

 

Inhabitat » TRANSPORTATION TUESDAY: Chocolate powered biodiesel

[freeztar]

Cool article Monomer. Where HAVE you been hiding btw? :shrug:

 

Here's some simple math from the article:

 

4,500 miles/80,000 chocolate bars=approximately 0.056 miles per chocolate bar

So you'd need about 18 chocolate bars to travel 1 mile.

 

I think I'd rather eat 'em! :shade:

[Michaelangelica]

What a shocking travesty

Chocolate used as bio-fuel (!)

use rainforests, subsidised corn, plastic waste, Indonesia, any thing before that!

"Chocolate lovers of the world unite. You have nothing to loose but your chocolate!":shade:

[Monomer]

Cool article Monomer. Where HAVE you been hiding btw? :)

 

Yeah, I've been slack!! Too many other things taking up my time :eek_big:

 

 

What a shocking travesty

Chocolate used as bio-fuel (!)

use rainforests, subsidised corn, plastic waste, Indonesia, any thing before that!

"Chocolate lovers of the world unite. You have nothing to loose but your chocolate!"

 

It's okay Michaelangelica! They're using the waste from the chocolate-making process so if you keep eating it then there will be more waste to use as fuel.

 

Chocoholics can assuage any guilt they may feel after a new process was developed that turns the by-products of making chocolate into a biofuel -- meaning you can eat your chocolate and be eco-friendly.

 

Eat more chocolate and help the environment | Environment | Reuters

 

Chocolate is turned into fuel (with video) - Lancashire Evening Post

[Michaelangelica]

Yeah, I've been slack!! Too many other things taking up my time

It's okay Michaelangelica! They're using the waste from the chocolate-making process so if you keep eating it then there will be more waste to use as fuel.

Phew, that's a relief

[Michaelangelica]

A little off topic but this article summeries the many issues surrounding bio-fuels

EG

Weighing Environmental Costs and Benefits

 

When crops grow, they absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, thus negating any greenhouse gas emissions that result from burning biofuels.

However, planting, fertilizing and harvesting the crop requires machinery that utilize fossil fuels, as do the fermentation, distillation and transportation processes.

All together, the energy required to generate one gallon of corn-based ethanol is equal to about 60-75 percent of the energy produced (NRDC, 2006).

As a result, GHG emissions are only reduced by 15-40 percent relative to oil on a per gallon basis (WorldWatch, 2006).

and

corn prices doubled last year, causing social unrest in Mexico where corn tortillas are a dietary staple (BBC News, 2007).

 

On the other hand, biofuel production can boost incomes in rural areas, where three-quarters of the world's poor reside, which may increase their ability to secure food supplies

March 2007 Monthly Update: Global Biofuel Trends | EarthTrends

[Michaelangelica]

I need a little THINK and will come back to to you all

-such great posts and me with no rep to give.

[Michaelangelica]

The beginnings of a biofuel backlash?

Europe, Cutting Biofuel Subsidies, Redirects Aid to Stress Greenest Options

 

By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL

Published: January 22, 2008[/i]

 

Governments in Europe and elsewhere have begun rolling back generous, across-the-board subsidies for biofuels, acknowledging that the environmental benefits of these fuels have often been overstated.

Skip to next paragraph

Enlarge This Image

Paul Dodds/Bloomberg News

 

A biofuel plant under construction in England in 2005. Countries in Europe are revising incentives for biofuel production.

 

But as they aim to be more selective, these governments are discovering how difficult it can be to figure out whether a particular fuel — much less a particular batch of corn ethanol or rapeseed biodiesel — has been produced in an environmentally friendly manner. Biofuels vary greatly in their environmental impact.

 

“A lot of countries are interested in doing this, but it’s really hard to do right,” said Ronald Steenblik, research director of the Global Subsidies Initiative in Geneva. “You can’t look at a bottle of ethanol and tell how it’s produced, whether it’s sustainable. You have to know: Was the crop produced on farmland or on recently cleared forest? Did the manufacturer use energy from coal or nuclear?”

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/22/business/worldbusiness/22biofuels.html?ref=science

[freeztar]

Good for them!

Corn ethanol subsidies in America are a joke imho.

[Michaelangelica]

Good for them!

Corn ethanol subsidies in America are a joke imho.

Yes agreed and I wonder how much money goes to the Corporate Farm rather than the Family Farm?

Because of the USA corn subsides and the Indonesian destruction of its environment for palm oil; biofuels have a bad name, which is a pity.

Indonesia will destroy anything where there is a buck to be made, as in their rape of forests, and genocide of the people, in Papua.

 

In Australia though, we can easily produce a lot more sugar cane without clearing forests. At the moment most goes for sugar or rum. Ethanol 10% mixes are available but the price break is just not there; even though the ethanol is not double taxed at petrol is.

 

Australians don't have to make a choice between food Vs alcohol. (:shrug: Um you know what I mean!)

 

We have not yet begun to research the possibilities of crops for dry desert areas or salt damaged or marginal land.

[freeztar]

We have not yet begun to research the possibilities of crops for dry desert areas or salt damaged or marginal land.

 

What about jatropa?

[Michaelangelica]

What about jatropa?

I think it has beeen mentioned. Post 34 etc

It sounds good

A little like the Castor Oil plant that grows wild around Sydney (?)

 

Jatropa Curcas: The Bio Diesel Medicinal Plant

 

J. mutabilis

This wonderful plant is not only used as for medicinal purposes but has now been developed as an alternative diesel fuel.

Jatropa Curcas: The Bio Diesel Medicinal Plant

Enlarge Image

Jatropa Curcas or locally known as Tuba Bakod in our country has been used by our ancestors as a folkloric medicine for rheumatic pains, snake bites and also insecticide. The leaves are used as medicine for muscle ailments like rheumatic pains. Simply by applying oil on the leaves and heated by flames and then applied to the skin on where the ailments are. Although it has medicinal properties, the fruit and seed is not edible and poisonous when ingested. The leaves have anti-inflammatory properties but toxic when excessively used internally. The pounded leaves when pounded and made into a poultice can be used to aid in snakebites and also effective as an insecticide.

It seems to have its own website?

Jatropha curcas news

Lots of Pics here

Google Image Result for http://mangalorean.com/images/features1/20070902jatropa23.jpg

 

A fairly tropical plant by the look of it.

[Michaelangelica]

:shrug: Candlenut Tree :)

I wonder if anyone has looked at these plants for biofuel.

I first saw it on Maj. gittins "ABC Bush Tucker " show.

The fruits are literally used as candles.

So they must contain heaps of oil/resin (??)

They seem to be grown in a VERY wide range of climates from Canberra to Queensland.

Kernels of the widespread candlenut tree (Aleurites moluccana) are about 60 percent oil.

In many countries this is extracted and used in paints and varnishes, as a

wood preservative and for lighting.

 

The nuts themselves will burn with a sooty flame and can be pulverised and moulded into a candle.

Aboriginal people found them useful when lighting fires in wet weather and the oil is useful for fixing ochre for painting.

 

The nuts are also extremely nutritious, containing more than 4200 micrograms of thiamine per hundred grams.

Only certain processed yeast products such as vegemite

contain more.

However, the raw nuts have a reputation for causing stomach upsets and are avoided by some Aboriginal groups.

Others, however, roast them in the fire to render them edible. This destroys a toxin in the oil,

http://www.wettropics.gov.au/st/st_pdf/fact%20sheets/bushtucker.pdf

 

Aleurites moluccana, the Candle Nut, is a tree with a wide distribution.

A fast growing species, it is often found in disturbed rainforests. It is described as a bushy tree to 20 metres with a wide spreading crown. Distribution is north-eastern Queensland and the Pacific Islands.

 

It makes a suitable shade tree and a good ornamental with its large leaves and attractive white flowers.

SGAP(Qld) - Bush Tucker - Candle Nut

 

 

A google search on making your own biofuels gives dozens of sites

EG

Making Biodiesel ...... Why?

At VegieCars, we prefer to modify the Fuel System rather than the fuel.

 

The diesel engine was originally designed by Rudolf Diesel to run on vegetable oil, and later came to be run on mineral fuels.

He thought that this engine could assist farmers to be more self sustaining, and not have to rely on outside inputs for their mechanisation.

Today most farm vehicles have a diesel motor, which many farmers could be operating from resources grown on their own farm!