Sir Richard Branson, of Virgin Atlantic Airways, has announced its plans to pioneer in the use of alternative biofuels to power its airplanes. The joint biofuel demonstration/testing will be in collaboration with Boeing Company and General Electric (GE). Initially, the tests will be done on a (passenger-free) Boeing 747-400 aircraft, using a fuel blend of 60% conventional aviation fuel and 40% alternative biofuel. If the test is successful, further trials are planned for a 50% conventional-50% biofuel blend.

One important requirement for aviation fuel is that it should not freeze at cold temperatures normally encountered at high altitudes. The fuel should have good “cold-flow properties”. Ethanol-based biofuels are said to freeze at 15,000 feet, and therefore may not be suitable. As an alternative to bioethanol, the use of next-generation biofuels, based on “biobutanol” and also synthetic biofuels (from thermochemical processing of biomass) have been mentioned. Africa has also been identified as one possible area where biofuel crops can be planted to meet biojetfuel demand, and at the same time, alleviate poverty in the continent.

“Biofuels” and “Bioenergy” are catchfire buzzwords that have generated global interest, spawning exponentially increasing information on new concepts and new developments/innovations for alternative fuels. A wide array of biofuel products and technologies are cropping up fast, and sometimes information overload can overwhelm the power of informed choice. Technical terms like “Fischer-tropsch”, “biobutanol”, “pyrolysis”, “thermal depolymerization”, etc, can be quite dizzying. For those who wish to catch up with the latest concepts in bioenergy (in a non-intimidating, encyclopedic way), “Biofuel Wiki” is an online knowledge portal which can provide user-friendly information about almost anything related to bioenergy. The knowledge portal also has comprehensive sections on bioenergy news, events, technical information resources, a comprehensive biofuels glossary and featured blogs, among others.

The site is said to be hosted by the National Wildlife Federation, and supported by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Heinrich Boell Foundation, Biomass Coordinating Council of the American Council on Renewable Energy (ACORE) and the Worldwatch Institute..

Ethanol blends as a transport fuel alternative, has been heralded as a “green fuel” which emits lower greenhouse gases compared to conventional fossil fuels. A new study based on a sophisticated air pollution/weather forecasting model shows that while ethanol blends may decrease some pollutants (like benzene and butadiene), it may also increase others (like acetaldehyde and formaldehyde). This study by Stanford University Associate Professor, Mark Jacobson, shows that increased use of E85 (a blend of 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline) may lead to a 9% increase in ozone related-deaths in greater Los Angeles and an 4% increase U.S. national average of the same deaths by 2020. The study (recently featured in the journal, Environmental Science and Technology) concludes that “E85 is unlikely to improve air quality over future gasoline vehicles” and that “unburned ethanol emissions from E85 may result in a global-scale source of (the pollutant) acetaldehyde larger than that of direct emissions”..