Jatropha: The Biofuel That Bombed Seeks A Path To Redemption
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Earlier this century, jatropha was hailed as a "wonder" biofuel. An unassuming shrubby tree native to Central America, it was hugely promoted as a high-yielding, drought-tolerant biofuel feedstock that could grow on abject lands across Latin America, Africa and Asia.
A jatropha rush took place, with more than 900,000 hectares (2.2 million acres) planted by 2008. But the bubble burst. Low yields led to plantation failures almost everywhere. The consequences of the jatropha crash was polluted by accusations of land grabbing, mismanagement, and overblown carbon decrease claims.
Today, some researchers continue pursuing the incredibly elusive guarantee of high-yielding jatropha. A return, they state, depends on cracking the yield issue and dealing with the harmful land-use problems linked with its initial failure.
The sole remaining large jatropha plantation is in Ghana. The plantation owner claims high-yield domesticated ranges have actually been attained and a new boom is at hand. But even if this resurgence fails, the world's experience of jatropha holds crucial lessons for any appealing up-and-coming biofuel.
At the beginning of the 21st century, Jatropha curcas, an unassuming shrub-like tree belonging to Central America, was planted across the world. The rush to jatropha was driven by its pledge as a sustainable source of biofuel that could be grown on degraded, unfertile lands so as not to displace food crops. But inflated claims of high yields failed.
Now, after years of research and advancement, the sole staying large plantation focused on growing jatropha remains in Ghana. And Singapore-based jOil, which owns that plantation, claims the jatropha resurgence is on.
"All those business that stopped working, adopted a plug-and-play design of searching for the wild varieties of jatropha. But to advertise it, you need to domesticate it. This belongs of the process that was missed out on [during the boom]," jOil CEO Vasanth Subramanian informed Mongabay in an interview.
Having gained from the mistakes of jatropha's previous failures, he states the oily plant could yet play a key role as a liquid biofuel feedstock, decreasing transport carbon emissions at the international level. A new boom could bring extra benefits, with jatropha likewise a prospective source of fertilizers and even bioplastics.
But some scientists are skeptical, keeping in mind that has actually already gone through one hype-and-fizzle cycle. They warn that if the plant is to reach complete potential, then it is necessary to learn from past errors. During the first boom, jatropha plantations were obstructed not just by bad yields, however by land grabbing, deforestation, and social problems in nations where it was planted, consisting of Ghana, where jOil operates.
Experts also suggest that jatropha's tale provides lessons for scientists and entrepreneurs exploring promising new sources for liquid biofuels - which exist aplenty.
Miracle shrub, major bust
Jatropha's early 21st-century appeal stemmed from its guarantee as a "second-generation" biofuel, which are sourced from lawns, trees and other plants not stemmed from edible crops such as maize, soy or oil palm. Among its numerous purported virtues was an ability to thrive on abject or "marginal" lands; therefore, it was declared it would never ever take on food crops, so the theory went.
At that time, jatropha ticked all packages, states Alexandros Gasparatos, now at the University of Tokyo's Institute for Future Initiatives. "We had a crop that seemed amazing; that can grow without too much fertilizer, too lots of pesticides, or too much demand for water, that can be exported [as fuel] abroad, and does not complete with food since it is toxic."
Governments, global agencies, financiers and business bought into the hype, releasing efforts to plant, or promise to plant, millions of hectares of jatropha. By 2008, plantations covered some 900,000 hectares (2.2 million acres) in Latin America, Africa and Asia, according to a market research study prepared for WWF.
It didn't take wish for the mirage of the incredible biofuel tree to fade.
In 2009, a Buddies of the Earth report from Eswatini (still known at the time as Swaziland) warned that jatropha's high needs for land would undoubtedly bring it into direct conflict with food crops. By 2011, a global evaluation noted that "growing outmatched both clinical understanding of the crop's capacity along with an understanding of how the crop fits into existing rural economies and the degree to which it can grow on marginal lands."
Projections estimated 4.7 million hectares (11.7 million acres) would be planted by 2010, and 12.8 million hectares (31.6 million acres) by 2015. However, just 1.19 million hectares (2.94 million acres) were growing by 2011. Projects and plantations began to fail as anticipated yields declined to materialize. Jatropha could grow on abject lands and endure drought conditions, as declared, but yields stayed bad.
"In my viewpoint, this combination of speculative financial investment, export-oriented capacity, and prospective to grow under relatively poorer conditions, produced a huge issue," resulting in "ignored yields that were going to be produced," Gasparatos states.
As jatropha plantations went from boom to bust, they were also pestered by ecological, social and economic troubles, state experts. Accusations of land grabs, the conversion of food crop lands, and clearing of natural areas were reported.
Studies found that land-use change for jatropha in nations such as Brazil, Mexico and Tanzania led to a loss of biodiversity. A study from Mexico discovered the "carbon repayment" of jatropha plantations due to associated forest loss varied between two and 14 years, and "in some circumstances, the carbon debt may never ever be recovered." In India, production revealed carbon advantages, however the use of fertilizers led to increases of soil and water "acidification, ecotoxicity, eutrophication."
"If you look at the majority of the plantations in Ghana, they claim that the jatropha produced was situated on marginal land, but the idea of limited land is really elusive," explains Abubakari Ahmed, a speaker at the University for Development Studies, Ghana. He studied the implications of jatropha plantations in the nation over numerous years, and found that a lax definition of "marginal" suggested that presumptions that the land co-opted for jatropha plantations had actually been lying untouched and unused was typically illusory.
"Marginal to whom?" he asks. "The reality that ... currently no one is utilizing [land] for farming does not suggest that nobody is utilizing it [for other purposes] There are a great deal of nature-based incomes on those landscapes that you may not necessarily see from satellite imagery."
Learning from jatropha
There are key lessons to be learned from the experience with jatropha, state experts, which must be hearkened when considering other advantageous second-generation biofuels.
"There was a boom [in investment], but unfortunately not of research, and action was taken based on supposed advantages of jatropha," says Bart Muys, a teacher in the Division of Forest, Nature and Landscape at the University of Leuven, Belgium. In 2014, as the jatropha hype was unwinding, Muys and coworkers published a paper citing essential lessons.
Fundamentally, he explains, there was an absence of understanding about the plant itself and its needs. This crucial requirement for in advance research study could be used to other potential biofuel crops, he states. Last year, for instance, his team launched a paper analyzing the yields of pongamia (Millettia pinnata), a "fast-growing, leguminous and multipurpose tree types" with biofuel pledge.
Like jatropha, pongamia can be grown on abject and marginal land. But Muys's research study showed yields to be extremely variable, contrary to other reports. The team concluded that "pongamia still can not be considered a substantial and steady source of biofuel feedstock due to persisting knowledge gaps." Use of such cautionary data could prevent wasteful financial speculation and negligent land conversion for new biofuels.
"There are other really promising trees or plants that might work as a fuel or a biomass manufacturer," Muys says. "We wished to avoid [them going] in the very same instructions of early hype and stop working, like jatropha."
Gasparatos highlights important requirements that should be met before moving ahead with new biofuel plantations: high yields should be opened, inputs to reach those yields understood, and a ready market needs to be offered.
"Basically, the crop requires to be domesticated, or [scientific understanding] at a level that we understand how it is grown," Gasparatos says. Jatropha "was almost undomesticated when it was promoted, which was so odd."
How biofuel lands are gotten is likewise essential, states Ahmed. Based upon experiences in Ghana where communally used lands were acquired for production, authorities must make sure that "standards are put in location to check how massive land acquisitions will be done and documented in order to decrease some of the problems we observed."
A jatropha return?
Despite all these obstacles, some scientists still believe that under the best conditions, jatropha might be a valuable biofuel solution - especially for the difficult-to-decarbonize transport sector "accountable for approximately one quarter of greenhouse gas emissions."
"I believe jatropha has some potential, however it requires to be the ideal product, grown in the right location, and so on," Muys stated.
Mohammad Alherbawi, a postdoctoral research study fellow at Qatar's Hamad Bin Khalifa University, continues holding out hope for jatropha. He sees it as a manner in which Qatar might lower airline carbon emissions. According to his quotes, its use as a jet fuel could result in about a 40% decrease of "cradle to grave" emissions.
Alherbawi's team is carrying out ongoing field research studies to boost jatropha yields by fertilizing crops with sewage sludge. As an added advantage, he envisages a jatropha green belt covering 20,000 hectares (nearly 50,000 acres) in Qatar. "The application of the green belt can really boost the soil and farming lands, and secure them against any further degeneration brought on by dust storms," he says.
But the Qatar job's success still hinges on numerous factors, not least the capability to acquire quality yields from the tree. Another vital action, Alherbawi explains, is scaling up production innovation that utilizes the entirety of the jatropha fruit to increase processing effectiveness.
Back in Ghana, jOil is presently handling more than 1,300 hectares (1,830 acres) of jatropha, and growing a pilot plot on 300 hectares (740 acres) dealing with more than 400 farmers. Subramanian discusses that years of research study and development have actually resulted in varieties of jatropha curcas that can now achieve the high yields that were lacking more than a decade earlier.
"We had the ability to speed up the yield cycle, improve the yield range and improve the fruit-bearing capability of the tree," Subramanian states. In essence, he specifies, the tree is now domesticated. "Our very first job is to expand our jatropha plantation to 20,000 hectares."
Biofuels aren't the only application JOil is taking a look at. The fruit and its byproducts could be a source of fertilizer, bio-candle wax, a charcoal substitute (crucial in Africa where much wood is still burned for cooking), and even bioplastics.
But it is the transport sector that still beckons as the perfect biofuels application, according to Subramanian. "The biofuels story has when again resumed with the energy transition drive for oil companies and bio-refiners - [driven by] the search for alternative fuels that would be emission friendly."
A complete jatropha curcas life-cycle evaluation has yet to be completed, however he thinks that cradle-to-grave greenhouse gas emissions connected to the oily plant will be "competitive ... These two aspects - that it is technically appropriate, and the carbon sequestration - makes it a very strong candidate for adoption for ... sustainable air travel," he says. "Our company believe any such growth will occur, [by clarifying] the meaning of degraded land, [allowing] no competitors with food crops, nor in any way threatening food security of any country."
Where next for jatropha?
Whether jatropha can genuinely be carbon neutral, environmentally friendly and socially accountable depends on intricate elements, including where and how it's grown - whether, for example, its production design is based in smallholder farms versus industrial-scale plantations, state specialists. Then there's the unpleasant problem of attaining high yields.
Earlier this year, the Bolivian federal government revealed its intent to pursue jatropha plantations in the Gran Chaco biome, part of a nationwide biofuels push that has actually stirred debate over prospective consequences. The Gran Chaco's dry forest biome is already in deep trouble, having been heavily deforested by aggressive agribusiness practices.
Many past plantations in Ghana, warns Ahmed, transformed dry savanna woodland, which became problematic for carbon accounting. "The net carbon was frequently negative in most of the jatropha websites, because the carbon sequestration of jatropha can not be compared to that of a shea tree," he explains.
Other scientists chronicle the "capacity of Jatropha curcas as an ecologically benign biodiesel feedstock" in Malaysia, Indonesia and India. But still other researchers stay uncertain of the ecological viability of second-generation biofuels. "If Mexico promotes biofuels, such as the exploitation of jatropha, the rebound is that it potentially ends up being so effective, that we will have a lot of associated land-use change," says Daniel Itzamna Avila-Ortega, co-founder of the Mexican Center of Industrial Ecology and a Ph.D. student with the Stockholm Resilience Centre; he has conducted research on the possibilities of jatropha adding to a circular economy in Mexico.
Avila-Ortega points out previous land-use issues connected with growth of numerous crops, including oil palm, sugarcane and avocado: "Our law enforcement is so weak that it can not deal with the economic sector doing whatever they want, in terms of producing ecological problems."
Researchers in Mexico are currently checking out jatropha-based livestock feed as an affordable and sustainable replacement for grain. Such uses may be well suited to local contexts, Avila-Ortega agrees, though he stays worried about prospective ecological costs.
He suggests restricting jatropha growth in Mexico to make it a "crop that conquers land," growing it only in really bad soils in need of restoration. "Jatropha could be among those plants that can grow in extremely sterilized wastelands," he explains. "That's the only way I would ever promote it in Mexico - as part of a forest recovery strategy for wastelands. Otherwise, the involved issues are greater than the possible benefits."
Jatropha's worldwide future remains unpredictable. And its potential as a tool in the battle against environment modification can only be unlocked, say many experts, by avoiding the list of troubles associated with its first boom.
Will jatropha tasks that sputtered to a halt in the early 2000s be fired back up again? Subramanian believes its role as a sustainable biofuel is "imminent" which the resurgence is on. "We have strong interest from the energy industry now," he says, "to work together with us to establish and broaden the supply chain of jatropha."
Banner image: Jatropha curcas trees in Hawai'i. Image by Forest and Kim Starr through Flickr (CC BY 2.0).
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