Re: [Biofuel] Jatropha vs Castor
Thx keith I missed out the castor oil discussion last time. Hello REXIS. The castor oil is highly questionable as a raw material for biodiesel production due to two important issues:: 1) The biodiesel from castor oil will have a too high viscosity well outside the specs. 2) The fatty acids of castor oil are very special and polymerize easily forming heavier compounds while releasing water. Unsuitable ? Yes. 0) Even cow fat can be made into biodiesel 1) They can process semi solid crude palm oil into biodiesel that can widthstand cold climate, perhaps we just need a little bit more process to work out the castor oil? But as I know, castor oil can stand extremely low temperature down to 15 degree C, this is a good properties. 2) What does this means? Shorter shelf life? Any reference? Are you sure it's wasteland? I think land is in short supply in India, any land. It has marketed as such tat many lands in India are arid, no agricultural value and idle. The idea is to cover all those so called unproductive land with Jatropha and then bring profit to rural people. But IMHO, at the moment, with the quotes in Keith's reply, the most who profit most is those Jatropha seeds supplier. A few months back, I saw a company promoting Jatropha in some agri fair, quoting RM1500 for each kg of seeds! And no kidding, people are rushing into planting Jatropha now even in Malaysia, without even properly understand the plant. You miss a major disadvantage, that the oilseed cake left after extraction is toxic and cannot be fed to livestock. That is almost always downplayed by jatropha fans, but it can seriously affect the economics of using jatropha as a biodiesel feedstock. Castor seedcake has 3-5% of ricin by weight, but I read about that it is possible to remove the toxin and make the cake into animal feed. Maybe they can do the same to Jatropha seed cake, like roast it or something. ther disadvantages are that it's difficult to extract the seed, and difficult to extract the oil from the seed. Its none the less extremely labourious to harvest the fruit, especially when the plants are too tall. In terms of extrating the oil from seed, how is it if compare to rapeseed? I have never touch a Jatropha seed before, so no idea how the physical properties is, but according to web picture, it looks like laychi seed and hardy. Castor seed, aka castor bean, lately I had encountered a few wild Castor Plant(and hence this discussion) and has took back some of its fruits. The castor seeds is more like oil sap, you can squezz it easily by hand, and then you can literally press the oil out with your fingers(wash your hand after doing so). Jatropha has it's place as an oil crop nonetheless, and so does castor oil, despite their disadvantages, but it depends on the place, on the local circumstances. Neither is likely to be a sole solution, but one of a range of solutions. So the idea is to produce a local renewable oil, whats the point to import biodiesel? You still depend on others. I always think that the idea of producing highly valuable biofuel and run them in fuel guzzler with a ruthless driver is absurd. Why not improve the vehicle and the people first. See, E85 sport car won a race, but is there a point? That your 6.0 V12 can be green? ___ Biofuel mailing list Biofuel@sustainablelists.org http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/biofuel_sustainablelists.org Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Search the combined Biofuel and Biofuels-biz list archives (50,000 messages): http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/
Re: [Biofuel] Jatropha vs Castor
No biofuel offers a real solution if it is simply a replacement for fossil fuels used according to the current patterns. That's what's wrong with the current corporate approach to biofuels. Biofuels do enable fuels to be manufactured on a small scale, which is a requirement of the real solution, that is, a reduction in the need to use vehicles to a level at which post-peak petroleum is not economically viable. The point about racing with E85 is simply that it's a lovely racing fuel. If you forget about perfidious-electronics-based flex-fuelery and start chasing the positive spirals that arise when you optimize an engine for E100 exclusively you end up with a 600bhp 1100 and wondering how to get enough bearing width and crank web thickness into so small a crankcase. If you don't go to such extremes it's the perfect hobby-car fuel - especially if the town's entire vehicle fleet consists of a hundred farm trucks, a dozen sports cars, and a first-strike pump. -Dawie - Original Message From: Rexis Tree [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: biofuel@sustainablelists.org Sent: Tuesday, 12 June, 2007 10:32:14 AM Subject: Re: [Biofuel] Jatropha vs Castor I always think that the idea of producing highly valuable biofuel and run them in fuel guzzler with a ruthless driver is absurd. Why not improve the vehicle and the people first. See, E85 sport car won a race, but is there a point? That your 6.0 V12 can be green? ___ New Yahoo! Mail is the ultimate force in competitive emailing. Find out more at the Yahoo! Mail Championships. Plus: play games and win prizes. http://uk.rd.yahoo.com/evt=44106/*http://mail.yahoo.net/uk ___ Biofuel mailing list Biofuel@sustainablelists.org http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/biofuel_sustainablelists.org Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Search the combined Biofuel and Biofuels-biz list archives (50,000 messages): http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/
Re: [Biofuel] Jatropha vs Castor
Hello REXIS. The castor oil is highly questionable as a raw material for biodiesel production due to two important issues:: 1) The biodiesel from castor oil will have a too high viscosity well outside the specs. 2) The fatty acids of castor oil are very special and polymerize easily forming heavier compounds while releasing water. Unsuitable ? Yes. With best regards Jan Warnqvist - Original Message - From: Rexis Tree To: biofuel@sustainablelists.org Sent: Monday, June 11, 2007 11:54 AM Subject: [Biofuel] Jatropha vs Castor I had did some web study on Castor and Jatropha. Jatropha, being promoted as the perfect biodiesel crop by India, is receiving international highlights and many investors are interested or even start investing in planting this crop. This may spoil the original intension of promoting Jatropha, when large forest was cleared again to make way for Jatropha plantation rather then planting them on the wasteland or marginal land where india planned to do. Castor, the beautiful yet deadly seeds of castor, has been long used as an non edible oil source by mankind, as well as in other industrial application like paint, nylon, food addictive, lubricant, etc. And castor oil is a unuqie oil that it can completely dissolve in alcohol(not too sure what that means, no catalyst needed?). Our focus here is obviously biofuel. About which is the better choice for biodiesel. Similarity: - drought resistance - oily seeds sitable for fuel purpose - seed cake made an excellence manure - poisonious and therefore producing non eatable oil - a kind of weed Jatropha advantage - it is said that Jatropha would trive on all kind of soil even rocky soil - Higher oil yield - it can improve the soil quality Jatropha disadvantage - since it is relatively new crop therefore it was not well understood, and inaccurate yield figure estimation may harm profit, more research and real data required - Jatropha is suitable for India where large area of their land consist of arid wasteland, but may not be suitable to other country like those with lots of rain forest. Castor advantage - Castor oil is one of the oldest traded goods, mankind has been trading castor oil since a few thousand years ago - Castor oil has a lot of industrial usage, therefore a market is already exsistance, thou limited - Since it was cultivated before in commercial plantation, its biology is well understood, and high yield hybrid is available - Castor can be found in medium climate area as an annual crop or in tropical area as a small tree - faster oil yield and long term yield is possible for tropical/warm area Castor disadvantage - It is said that castor will exhaust the soil quickly, fertilizer required to maintain a large castor plantation for a reasonable yield, but castor can often been seen as weed growing without attension, therefore it is possible to plant it as marginal plant in unattended idle area. - it notorious poison is feared by the public, perhaps a research on castor poison(ricin) remedy is necessary. I do not have a conclusion currently, but as you can see, I am trying to open up Castor as an extra option here. Discussion: - Cultivation requirement: Jatropha maybe able to trive on most kind of soil, but I believe that to yield reasonable harvest, irrigation and fertilizer still required. Castor, while the cultivation requirement is better understood then Jatropha, it is still unknown about which one gets better yield if left unattended in a poor condition area, it is possible that each of them will exceed another under specific senarior, intercropping of castor and jatropha also an interesting subject. - Harvesting: it seems like it is more labourious to harvest Jatropha, which its yield grow as scattered fruit, yes, olive harvester can be modified to harvest Jatropha but it will involved high capital. Castor seem to be easier to harvest as its yeild made of a branch of fruit, worker can just cut the whole branch at once. - Toxicity: It seems that castor seeds are much more deadly then Jatropha, its toxic, which was being used in assasination, implies that it is extremely deadly and no remedy avaibale; however castor oil is perfectly harmless due to the fact that the toxic is only water soluble not oil soluble. Jatropha, even though toxic, in some case, was roasted and being eaten dangerously, but note that Jatropha toxic is deadly as well can kill a person by a 5-6 seeds, I am unable to find more articles about its toxicity and remedy about Jatropha here. Both plant is said can be detoxify by simply heating it and thurs destroying the toxic protein, confirmation needed here thou. - Cost: this is also a main factor, the lower input with higher outcome is desired. Any other topics are welcome. Just my 1/2 cents, top up or add on are most welcome. Regards
Re: [Biofuel] Jatropha vs Castor
Hi Jan, Rexis Hello REXIS. The castor oil is highly questionable as a raw material for biodiesel production due to two important issues:: 1) The biodiesel from castor oil will have a too high viscosity well outside the specs. 2) The fatty acids of castor oil are very special and polymerize easily forming heavier compounds while releasing water. Thankyou - I didn't know it releases water while polymerising. (It's about 87% ricinoleic acid.) Actually it's a very stable oil, it takes heat to polymerise it. Because of how it works the polymerisation works as a benefit when castor oil is used as lubricating oil. As fuel, in biodiesel form, it would seem it would only get enough heat to polymerise once it's in the combustion chamber, but it wouldn't be there long enough for that before it combusts. If it does manage to release any water at that stage, it might not be a bad thing. A lot of work is being done on water injection and fuel-water emulsions, for the resulting emissions reductions. So I'm not sure the polymerising is an obstacle. The high viscosity is an obstacle, but nonetheless a lot of castor oil biodiesel is being produced and traded and used. Rexis, there has been a lot of previous discussion about castor oil and biodiesel, please see these archives links: http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/msg64046.html Re: [Biofuel] Castor oil http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/msg61669.html Re: [Biofuel] sustainable biodiesel from Casto : Big is not beautiful, s You should use the list archives please. Unsuitable ? Yes. With best regards Jan Warnqvist - Original Message - From: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]Rexis Tree To: mailto:biofuel@sustainablelists.orgbiofuel@sustainablelists.org Sent: Monday, June 11, 2007 11:54 AM Subject: [Biofuel] Jatropha vs Castor I had did some web study on Castor and Jatropha. Jatropha, being promoted as the perfect biodiesel crop by India, is receiving international highlights and many investors are interested or even start investing in planting this crop. This may spoil the original intension of promoting Jatropha, when large forest was cleared again to make way for Jatropha plantation rather then planting them on the wasteland or marginal land where india planned to do. Castor, the beautiful yet deadly seeds of castor, has been long used as an non edible oil source by mankind, as well as in other industrial application like paint, nylon, food addictive, lubricant, etc. And castor oil is a unuqie oil that it can completely dissolve in alcohol(not too sure what that means, no catalyst needed?). It means that in theory castor oil can be used in ethanol production to separate the distilled ethanol from the 5% or more of water it will contain, producing anhydrous ethanol that can be used for production of ethyl esters biodiesel (and anhydrous ethanol can also be blended with gasoline for fuel use, but not if there's any water in it). Again, please use the archives. Our focus here is obviously biofuel. About which is the better choice for biodiesel. There really is no one-size-fits-all better choice for biodiesel. Biofuels production only makes sense at the local level, which means that the best choice will vary very widely depending on the local circumstances. By the way, I don't think you should be thinking in terms of industrialised monocrops and plantations and irrigation and fertilisers (along with mass-murder pesticides like paraquat), wrong direction, and no need for it. It's the wrong paradigm for biofuels production, it will almost always have negative repercussions, often severe, no matter which best crop you use. Similarity: - drought resistance - oily seeds sitable for fuel purpose - seed cake made an excellence manure Castor oil seedcake? With jatropha seedcake it's just an excuse - all oilseed cake makes an effective fertiliser but it's usually considered a waste, it's a better use to feed it to livestock and use the livestock manure as fertiliser. - poisonious and therefore producing non eatable oil - a kind of weed Jatropha advantage - it is said that Jatropha would trive on all kind of soil even rocky soil There are many trees that are just as hardy as jatropha, including oil-bearing trees that don't have some of jatropha's disadvantages. - Higher oil yield Higher than what, than castor oil? I doubt it. - it can improve the soil quality Allegedly, because it's a legume, and legumes fix nitrogen in their roots. Whether they actually do so or not and to what extent depends on a lot of things. Again, many other trees are legumes, including oil-bearing trees. Jatropha disadvantage - since it is relatively new crop therefore it was not well understood, and inaccurate yield figure estimation may harm profit, more research and real data required - Jatropha is suitable for India where large area of their land consist of arid wasteland, Are you
