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Jatropha: the Biofuel that Bombed Seeks a Course 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 extremely promoted as a high-yielding, drought-tolerant biofuel feedstock that could grow on degraded lands throughout Latin America, Africa and Asia.

A jatropha rush occurred, with more than 900,000 hectares (2.2 million acres) planted by 2008. But the bubble burst. Low yields resulted in plantation failures nearly everywhere. The aftermath of the jatropha crash was tainted by accusations of land grabbing, mismanagement, and overblown carbon reduction claims.

Today, some scientists continue pursuing the evasive pledge of high-yielding jatropha. A return, they state, depends on breaking the yield problem and addressing the hazardous land-use concerns linked with its initial failure.

The sole remaining large jatropha plantation is in Ghana. The plantation owner declares high-yield domesticated ranges have been achieved and a new boom is at hand. But even if this comeback falters, the world’s experience of jatropha holds important lessons for any appealing up-and-coming biofuel.

At the start of the 21st century, Jatropha curcas, a simple shrub-like tree native to Central America, was planted throughout the world. The rush to jatropha was driven by its guarantee as a sustainable source of biofuel that might 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 development, the sole staying large plantation focused on growing jatropha is in Ghana. And Singapore-based jOil, which owns that plantation, declares the jatropha resurgence is on.

“All those business that failed, embraced a plug-and-play model of hunting for the wild ranges of jatropha. But to advertise it, you require to domesticate it. This is a part of the procedure 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 an essential role as a liquid biofuel feedstock, minimizing transport carbon emissions at the global level. A brand-new boom might bring fringe benefits, with jatropha likewise a possible source of fertilizers and even bioplastics.

But some scientists are doubtful, noting that jatropha has actually already gone through one hype-and-fizzle cycle. They caution that if the plant is to reach complete potential, then it is necessary to learn from past mistakes. During the very first boom, jatropha plantations were hampered not just by bad yields, but by land grabbing, logging, and social issues in nations where it was planted, including Ghana, where jOil operates.

Experts likewise suggest that jatropha’s tale offers lessons for researchers and business owners exploring appealing new sources for liquid biofuels – which exist aplenty.

Miracle shrub, major bust

Jatropha’s early 21st-century appeal stemmed from its pledge as a “second-generation” biofuel, which are sourced from yards, trees and other plants not obtained from edible crops such as maize, soy or oil palm. Among its multiple supposed virtues was an ability to flourish on abject or “limited” lands; hence, it was declared it would never take on food crops, so the theory went.

At that time, jatropha ticked all packages, says Alexandros Gasparatos, now at the University of Tokyo’s Institute for Future Initiatives. “We had a crop that appeared amazing; that can grow without excessive fertilizer, too numerous pesticides, or too much demand for water, that can be exported [as fuel] abroad, and does not complete with food because it is toxic.”

Governments, global agencies, financiers and business purchased 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 study prepared for WWF.

It didn’t take wish for the mirage of the tree to fade.

In 2009, a Buddies of the Earth report from Eswatini (still known at the time as Swaziland) alerted that jatropha’s high demands for land would indeed bring it into direct conflict with food crops. By 2011, a worldwide evaluation kept in mind that “growing outmatched both scientific understanding of the crop’s potential as well as an understanding of how the crop fits into existing rural economies and the degree to which it can thrive on limited lands.”

Projections approximated 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 started to fail as anticipated yields refused to emerge. Jatropha might grow on abject lands and endure dry spell conditions, as claimed, but yields remained bad.

“In my viewpoint, this mix of speculative financial investment, export-oriented capacity, and possible to grow under relatively poorer conditions, developed a huge problem,” leading to “undervalued yields that were going to be produced,” Gasparatos states.

As jatropha plantations went from boom to bust, they were also plagued by environmental, social and economic problems, say specialists. Accusations of land grabs, the conversion of food crop lands, and clearing of natural locations were reported.

Studies found that land-use modification for jatropha in countries such as Brazil, Mexico and Tanzania caused a loss of biodiversity. A study from Mexico found the “carbon repayment” of jatropha plantations due to associated forest loss ranged in between 2 and 14 years, and “in some scenarios, the carbon debt might never be recovered.” In India, production revealed carbon benefits, but the use of fertilizers resulted in boosts of soil and water “acidification, ecotoxicity, eutrophication.”

“If you take a look at the majority of the plantations in Ghana, they declare that the jatropha produced was located on minimal land, however the idea of limited land is very elusive,” discusses Abubakari Ahmed, a speaker at the University for Development Studies, Ghana. He studied the ramifications of jatropha plantations in the country over numerous years, and found that a lax definition of “minimal” meant 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 doesn’t suggest that nobody is utilizing it [for other functions] There are a great deal of nature-based incomes on those landscapes that you might not always see from satellite imagery.”

Learning from jatropha

There are key lessons to be gained from the experience with jatropha curcas, say experts, which ought to be observed when considering other advantageous second-generation biofuels.

“There was a boom [in financial investment], however regrettably not of research, and action was taken based on alleged benefits of jatropha,” states Bart Muys, a professor in the Division of Forest, Nature and Landscape at the University of Leuven, Belgium. In 2014, as the jatropha hype was winding down, Muys and coworkers released a paper citing crucial lessons.

Fundamentally, he explains, there was a lack of understanding about the plant itself and its requirements. This vital requirement for upfront research study might be applied to other prospective biofuel crops, he states. In 2015, for example, his group launched a paper examining the yields of pongamia (Millettia pinnata), a “fast-growing, leguminous and multipurpose tree types” with biofuel guarantee.

Like jatropha, pongamia can be grown on abject and minimal land. But Muys’s research showed yields to be extremely variable, contrary to other reports. The team concluded that “pongamia still can not be considered a significant and stable source of biofuel feedstock due to persisting knowledge spaces.” Use of such cautionary data might prevent inefficient monetary speculation and reckless land conversion for brand-new biofuels.

“There are other extremely promising trees or plants that might serve as a fuel or a biomass manufacturer,” Muys says. “We wished to prevent [them going] in the very same direction of early hype and fail, like jatropha.”

Gasparatos underlines crucial requirements that should be met before moving ahead with brand-new biofuel plantations: high yields must be unlocked, inputs to reach those yields understood, and an all set market needs to be available.

“Basically, the crop needs to be domesticated, or [clinical understanding] at a level that we know how it is grown,” Gasparatos says. jatropha curcas “was practically undomesticated when it was promoted, which was so odd.”

How biofuel lands are gotten is also crucial, states Ahmed. Based upon experiences in Ghana where communally utilized lands were bought for production, authorities should make sure that “standards are put in location to inspect how large-scale land acquisitions will be done and documented in order to decrease a few of the problems we observed.”

A jatropha resurgence?

Despite all these obstacles, some researchers still think that under the ideal conditions, jatropha might be an important biofuel solution – particularly for the difficult-to-decarbonize transportation sector “responsible for around one quarter of greenhouse gas emissions.”

“I believe jatropha has some prospective, but it requires to be the best product, grown in the ideal place, and so on,” Muys said.

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 may lower airline carbon emissions. According to his price quotes, its usage as a jet fuel could lead to about a 40% reduction of “cradle to grave” emissions.

Alherbawi’s team is carrying out continuous field studies to improve jatropha yields by fertilizing crops with sewage sludge. As an added benefit, he imagines a jatropha green belt covering 20,000 hectares (almost 50,000 acres) in Qatar. “The application of the green belt can actually boost the soil and agricultural lands, and safeguard them against any additional deterioration triggered by dust storms,” he states.

But the Qatar job’s success still depends upon numerous elements, not least the ability to get quality yields from the tree. Another important step, Alherbawi explains, is scaling up production innovation that uses the totality of the jatropha fruit to increase processing performance.

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 and advancement have led to varieties of jatropha that can now accomplish the high yields that were doing not have more than a years earlier.

“We were able to accelerate the yield cycle, enhance the yield variety and boost the fruit-bearing capacity of the tree,” Subramanian states. In essence, he mentions, the tree is now domesticated. “Our first task is to expand our jatropha plantation to 20,000 hectares.”

Biofuels aren’t the only application JOil is looking at. The fruit and its byproducts could be a source of fertilizer, bio-candle wax, a charcoal replacement (crucial in Africa where much wood is still burned for cooking), and even bioplastics.

But it is the transportation sector that still beckons as the perfect biofuels application, according to Subramanian. “The biofuels story has once again resumed with the energy shift drive for oil companies and bio-refiners – [driven by] the look for alternative fuels that would be emission friendly.”

A complete jatropha life-cycle evaluation has yet to be completed, however he believes that cradle-to-grave greenhouse gas emissions associated with the oily plant will be “competitive … These two aspects – that it is technically appropriate, and the carbon sequestration – makes it an extremely strong candidate for adoption for … sustainable air travel,” he says. “We believe any such growth will occur, [by clarifying] the definition of abject land, [enabling] no competition with food crops, nor in any way endangering food security of any nation.”

Where next for jatropha?

Whether jatropha can truly be carbon neutral, environment-friendly and socially accountable depends on complex aspects, including where and how it’s grown – whether, for instance, its production model is based in smallholder farms versus industrial-scale plantations, say specialists. Then there’s the irritating problem of accomplishing high yields.

Earlier this year, the Bolivian government revealed its intent to pursue jatropha plantations in the Gran Chaco biome, part of a national biofuels press that has stirred debate over possible effects. The Gran Chaco’s dry forest biome is already in deep problem, having actually been heavily deforested by aggressive agribusiness practices.

Many previous plantations in Ghana, alerts Ahmed, converted dry savanna forest, which became troublesome for carbon accounting. “The net carbon was frequently negative in the majority of the jatropha websites, since the carbon sequestration of jatropha can not be compared to that of a shea tree,” he describes.

Other scientists chronicle the “capacity of Jatropha curcas as an environmentally benign biodiesel feedstock” in Malaysia, Indonesia and India. But still other researchers stay doubtful of the environmental viability of second-generation biofuels. “If Mexico promotes biofuels, such as the exploitation of jatropha, the rebound is that it possibly becomes 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. trainee with the Stockholm Resilience Centre; he has conducted research on the possibilities of jatropha contributing to a circular economy in Mexico.

Avila-Ortega cites 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 cope with the personal sector doing whatever they desire, in regards to producing environmental problems.”

Researchers in Mexico are currently exploring jatropha-based livestock feed as a low-cost and sustainable replacement for grain. Such uses might be well matched to regional contexts, Avila-Ortega concurs, though he remains worried about possible ecological expenses.

He recommends limiting jatropha growth in Mexico to make it a “crop that conquers land,” growing it just in truly bad soils in requirement of restoration. “Jatropha might be among those plants that can grow in extremely sterile wastelands,” he discusses. “That’s the only way I would ever promote it in Mexico – as part of a forest healing technique for wastelands. Otherwise, the involved problems are higher than the potential advantages.”

Jatropha’s global future remains unsure. And its possible as a tool in the fight versus climate change can just be unlocked, state many specialists, by preventing the litany of problems related to its first boom.

Will jatropha tasks that sputtered to a halt in the early 2000s be fired back up once again? Subramanian believes its role as a sustainable biofuel is “imminent” and that the resurgence is on. “We have strong interest from the energy industry now,” he states, “to team up 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).

A liquid biofuels guide: Carbon-cutting hopes vs. real-world impacts

Citations:

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Romijn, H., Heijnen, S., Colthoff, J. R., De Jong, B., & Van Eijck, J. (2014 ). Economic and social sustainability performance of jatropha jobs: Results from field surveys in Mozambique, Tanzania and Mali. Sustainability, 6( 9 ), 6203-6235. doi:10.3390/ su6096203

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Ahmed, A., Jarzebski, M. P., & Gasparatos, A. (2018 ). Using the community service technique to figure out whether jatropha projects were located in minimal lands in Ghana: Implications for site selection. Biomass and Bioenergy, 114, 112-124. doi:10.1016/ j.biombioe.2017.07.020

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Alherbawi, M., McKay, G., Govindan, R., Haji, M., & Al-Ansari, T. (2022 ). A novel technique on the delineation of a multipurpose energy-greenbelt to produce biofuel and fight desertification in arid regions. Journal of Environmental Management, 323, 116223. doi:10.1016/ j.jenvman.2022.116223

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