Technology

What are biofuels Biofuels are substances that are derived from natural sources such as plant matter and are used as a replacement for normal fuel with the intention of creating a source of fuel thats economically viable and environmentally friendly. The focus of this paper is the biofuel Biodiesel and its variant using the Jatropha curcas plant as an effective and economically viable source of fuel.

Biodesel
Jatropha curcas is a poisonous scrub weed of the euphorbia family originating in Central America. One of its most interesting characteristics is that its seeds have a high content of natural oils and when processed produce a naturally occurring fuel that can replace diesel fuel in cars. One of its selling points is that the plant requires little supervision after being planted, requires little water, no fertilizer, and can be planted on land deemed unsuitable for normal food crops however ideal for any other sort of farming venture. As such planting Jatropha does not cause any danger in a shortage of a countrys food supply since it doesnt need to have the same sort of land requirements that corn, sugar cane or soy have. Not only that other biofuel sources such as corn, sugar canes or soy beans which also serve another purpose such as being part of a country staple diet cause problems with the local economy since their use as a biofuel causes their prices to dramatically shoot up since more and more of the crop is devoted to the creation of biofuel and less towards feeding people. Jastropha is largely inedible and doesnt need the same type of soil, in fact it can grow just fine in inferior soil and thrive.

Simplified Version

Fuel Storage Methods
Biodiesel actually has poor oxidation stability hence there is a need for oxidation stabilizers to be added to the fuel mix in order to address the issue of long term storage. Not only that since biodiesel is actually organic in origin it does have a tendency to turn into a gel like substance at very low temperatures so there is a need to place proper insulation in the tanks. The tanks needed to store biodiesel must then be made of materials that dont oxidize easily and have proper insulation such as aluminum or steel tanks.

By using the online CO2 emission calculator of the website we will be able to see the difference between the C02 emissions of diesel and biodiesel using two examples to show the difference in the small to large scale. For the small scale the example will use two exactly identical cars with one using normal gasoline and the other using biodiesel. The control factors behind this example are the following

A.)The type of car used is a diesel lower medium car an example of which is the Ford Focus.
B.)The mileage of both cars will be 12,000 miles for the current year and a previous mileage of 10,000 miles for last year.
C.)1 car completely uses biodiesel while the other uses normal diesel.
D.)Both cars are less than 14 years old.
E.)And finally both cars are used by only one person.

Example First select the type of car you have from the list.
From your last and previous MOT certificates enter the recorded mileages into the table below. The table will subtract the previous from the last to give you last years mileage. Make a guess at your share of the cars use, and enter this in the table below, as a decimal. For example if you are the sole user of the car, enter your share as 1. If your share is 50, enter 0.5 for one third enter 0.33, for 25 enter 0.25, etc.

Large Scale
In the large scale example we will be using two examples 1 being a diesel power plant and the other being a biodiesel power plant with the calculations yet again courtesy of. The factors for the example are
2 Power plants 1 is a biodiesel power plant the other a diesel power plan and 1 millions liters of fuel used every day of the year.

In both examples you will notice that biodiesel is given half the conversion factor for C02 emissions this is due to the fact that while biodiesel does release almost the same amount of C02 into the air as regular diesel the fact remains that more Jatropha plants are planted to renew the resource which in turn reabsorbs the CO2 that was released. This is different from the normal diesel fuel burning cycle wherein as soon as the C02 is released into the air the mechanism needed to reabsorb the released C02 is left up to nature to deal with and not through human interference like the Jatropha plant cycle wherein humans take an active role in ensuring the sustainability of the resource by planting more of the said plant which naturally reabsorbs