Jatropha: The Biofuel That Bombed Seeks A Course To Redemption

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Earlier this century, jatropha was hailed as a "miracle" biofuel. A simple shrubby tree native to Central America, it was wildly 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 caused plantation failures almost everywhere. The aftermath of the jatropha crash was polluted by allegations of land grabbing, mismanagement, and overblown carbon decrease claims.

Today, some researchers continue pursuing the evasive guarantee of high-yielding jatropha. A comeback, they say, depends on breaking the yield problem and attending to the harmful land-use issues linked with its original failure.

The sole staying big jatropha plantation remains in Ghana. The plantation owner declares high-yield domesticated varieties have been accomplished and a new boom is at hand. But even if this comeback 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 native to Central America, was planted across 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 remaining large plantation concentrated on growing jatropha remains in Ghana. And Singapore-based jOil, which owns that plantation, declares the jatropha comeback is on.


"All those companies that failed, embraced a plug-and-play design of searching for the wild varieties of jatropha. But to commercialize it, you require to domesticate it. This belongs of the procedure that was missed out on [throughout the boom]," jOil CEO Vasanth Subramanian told Mongabay in an interview.


Having gained from the mistakes of jatropha's past failures, he says the oily plant might yet play an essential role as a liquid biofuel feedstock, decreasing transportation carbon emissions at the worldwide level. A brand-new boom could bring fringe benefits, with jatropha also a potential source of fertilizers and even bioplastics.


But some researchers are skeptical, keeping in mind that jatropha has currently gone through one . They warn that if the plant is to reach complete capacity, then it is necessary to gain from past mistakes. During the first boom, jatropha plantations were obstructed not just by poor yields, however by land grabbing, deforestation, and social issues in nations where it was planted, consisting of Ghana, where jOil operates.


Experts likewise recommend that jatropha's tale uses lessons for researchers and business owners checking out promising new sources for liquid biofuels - which exist aplenty.


Miracle shrub, major bust


Jatropha's early 21st-century appeal came 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 several purported virtues was an ability to grow on degraded or "limited" 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 appeared amazing; that can grow without too much fertilizer, a lot of pesticides, or excessive need for water, that can be exported [as fuel] abroad, and does not contend with food because it is toxic."


Governments, worldwide agencies, financiers and companies purchased into the hype, releasing efforts to plant, or pledge to plant, countless 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 incredible biofuel tree to fade.


In 2009, a Friends of the Earth report from Eswatini (still known at the time as Swaziland) alerted that jatropha's high demands for land would undoubtedly bring it into direct dispute with food crops. By 2011, a global evaluation kept in mind that "growing surpassed both scientific understanding of the crop's potential in addition to an understanding of how the crop suits existing rural economies and the degree to which it can prosper 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, only 1.19 million hectares (2.94 million acres) were growing by 2011. Projects and plantations started to stop working as anticipated yields declined to materialize. Jatropha could grow on abject lands and tolerate drought conditions, as declared, however yields remained poor.


"In my viewpoint, this combination of speculative investment, export-oriented potential, and prospective to grow under relatively poorer conditions, created a very huge issue," leading to "underestimated yields that were going to be produced," Gasparatos says.


As jatropha plantations went from boom to bust, they were likewise pestered by ecological, social and financial problems, say specialists. Accusations of land grabs, the conversion of food crop lands, and clearing of natural areas were reported.


Studies discovered that land-use change for jatropha in nations such as Brazil, Mexico and Tanzania resulted in a loss of biodiversity. A research study from Mexico discovered the "carbon payback" of jatropha plantations due to involved forest loss ranged in between 2 and 14 years, and "in some situations, the carbon debt might never be recovered." In India, production showed carbon advantages, but the usage of fertilizers led to boosts of soil and water "acidification, ecotoxicity, eutrophication."


"If you take a look at most of the plantations in Ghana, they declare that the jatropha produced was positioned on minimal land, however the concept of marginal land is extremely elusive," explains Abubakari Ahmed, a lecturer at the University for Development Studies, Ghana. He studied the implications of jatropha plantations in the nation over a number of years, and found that a lax definition of "marginal" suggested that assumptions that the land co-opted for jatropha plantations had actually been lying untouched and unused was often illusory.


"Marginal to whom?" he asks. "The reality that ... currently nobody is utilizing [land] for farming doesn't indicate that nobody is using it [for other purposes] There are a lot of nature-based livelihoods on those landscapes that you might not always see from satellite images."


Learning from jatropha


There are essential lessons to be gained from the experience with jatropha, state analysts, which must be hearkened when considering other auspicious second-generation biofuels.


"There was a boom [in investment], but sadly not of research study, and action was taken based on alleged benefits of jatropha," states Bart Muys, a teacher in the Division of Forest, Nature and Landscape at the University of Leuven, Belgium. In 2014, as the jatropha curcas buzz was winding down, Muys and colleagues published a paper mentioning crucial lessons.


Fundamentally, he describes, there was a lack of knowledge about the plant itself and its needs. This essential requirement for upfront research study might be used to other potential biofuel crops, he says. Last year, for instance, his team released a paper examining 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 revealed yields to be extremely variable, contrary to other reports. The team concluded that "pongamia still can not be considered a considerable and stable source of biofuel feedstock due to persisting understanding spaces." Use of such cautionary data could avoid inefficient financial speculation and careless land conversion for new biofuels.


"There are other extremely promising trees or plants that might act as a fuel or a biomass manufacturer," Muys states. "We wanted to prevent [them going] in the very same direction of premature buzz and fail, like jatropha."


Gasparatos highlights crucial requirements that must be fulfilled before moving ahead with new biofuel plantations: high yields should be opened, inputs to reach those yields comprehended, and a ready market needs to be readily available.


"Basically, the crop requires to be domesticated, or [scientific understanding] at a level that we understand how it is grown," Gasparatos states. Jatropha "was practically undomesticated when it was promoted, which was so unusual."


How biofuel lands are gotten is likewise essential, states Ahmed. Based upon experiences in Ghana where communally used lands were bought for production, authorities should ensure that "guidelines are put in location to check how massive land acquisitions will be done and documented in order to lower some of the issues we observed."


A jatropha resurgence?


Despite all these challenges, some researchers still think that under the best conditions, jatropha might be an important biofuel option - especially for the difficult-to-decarbonize transport sector "accountable for approximately one quarter of greenhouse gas emissions."


"I think jatropha has some prospective, however it needs to be the best product, grown in the right place, and so on," Muys stated.


Mohammad Alherbawi, a postdoctoral research fellow at Qatar's Hamad Bin Khalifa University, continues holding out hope for jatropha. He sees it as a manner in which Qatar might minimize airline company carbon emissions. According to his price quotes, its usage as a jet fuel might lead to about a 40% decrease of "cradle to tomb" emissions.


Alherbawi's group is conducting ongoing field studies to improve jatropha yields by fertilizing crops with sewage sludge. As an added advantage, he imagines a jatropha green belt spanning 20,000 hectares (almost 50,000 acres) in Qatar. "The execution of the green belt can truly improve the soil and agricultural lands, and safeguard them against any more deterioration caused by dust storms," he states.


But the Qatar job's success still hinges on many elements, not least the ability to acquire quality yields from the tree. Another essential step, Alherbawi discusses, is scaling up production technology that utilizes the totality of the jatropha fruit to increase processing efficiency.


Back in Ghana, jOil is currently handling more than 1,300 hectares (1,830 acres) of jatropha, and growing a pilot plot on 300 hectares (740 acres) working with more than 400 farmers. Subramanian discusses that years of research study and advancement have led to varieties of jatropha that can now attain the high yields that were doing not have more than a years earlier.


"We had the ability to quicken 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 job is to broaden our jatropha plantation to 20,000 hectares."


Biofuels aren't the only application JOil is taking a look at. The fruit and its by-products could be a source of fertilizer, bio-candle wax, a charcoal substitute (essential 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 actually when again reopened with the energy transition 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, but he thinks that cradle-to-grave greenhouse gas emissions associated with the oily plant will be "competitive ... These 2 elements - that it is technically suitable, and the carbon sequestration - makes it a really strong prospect for adoption for ... sustainable air travel," he says. "We believe any such growth will take location, [by clarifying] the definition of degraded land, [permitting] no competitors with food crops, nor in any way endangering food security of any country."


Where next for jatropha curcas?


Whether jatropha can truly be carbon neutral, environment-friendly and socially responsible depends on complicated aspects, including where and how it's grown - whether, for example, its production design is based in smallholder farms versus industrial-scale plantations, say professionals. Then there's the nagging problem of attaining high yields.


Earlier this year, the Bolivian government revealed its intent to pursue jatropha plantations in the Gran Chaco biome, part of a nationwide biofuels push that has stirred argument over possible consequences. The Gran Chaco's dry forest biome is already in deep problem, having been greatly deforested by aggressive agribusiness practices.


Many past plantations in Ghana, warns Ahmed, transformed dry savanna forest, which ended up being problematic for carbon accounting. "The net carbon was frequently negative in the majority of the jatropha sites, due to the fact that the carbon sequestration of jatropha can not be compared to that of a shea tree," he discusses.


Other scientists chronicle the "potential of Jatropha curcas as an ecologically benign biodiesel feedstock" in Malaysia, Indonesia and India. But still other scientists stay doubtful of the ecological practicality of second-generation biofuels. "If Mexico promotes biofuels, such as the exploitation of jatropha, the rebound is that it perhaps ends up being so successful, that we will have a great deal 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 performed research study on the possibilities of jatropha adding to a circular economy in Mexico.


Avila-Ortega mentions previous land-use problems connected with growth of various crops, consisting of oil palm, sugarcane and avocado: "Our law enforcement is so weak that it can not manage the personal sector doing whatever they want, in terms of developing environmental problems."


Researchers in Mexico are presently checking out jatropha-based animals feed as a low-priced and sustainable replacement for grain. Such uses may be well fit to regional contexts, Avila-Ortega concurs, though he stays concerned about possible environmental costs.


He suggests limiting jatropha expansion in Mexico to make it a "crop that conquers land," growing it only in genuinely poor soils in need of repair. "Jatropha could be among those plants that can grow in extremely sterile wastelands," he explains. "That's the only way I would ever promote it in Mexico - as part of a forest healing method for wastelands. Otherwise, the associated problems are higher than the potential advantages."


Jatropha's global future stays uncertain. And its possible as a tool in the fight against environment modification can just be opened, state numerous experts, by avoiding the list of problems related to its first boom.


Will jatropha tasks that sputtered to a stop in the early 2000s be fired back up again? Subramanian thinks its function as a sustainable biofuel is "imminent" which the comeback is on. "We have strong interest from the energy industry now," he states, "to team up with us to establish and expand 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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