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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 might grow on degraded lands throughout Latin America, Africa and Asia.
A jatropha rush ensued, with more than 900,000 hectares (2.2 million acres) planted by 2008. But the bubble burst. Low yields resulted in plantation failures almost everywhere. The after-effects of the jatropha crash was tainted by allegations of land grabbing, mismanagement, and overblown carbon decrease claims.
Today, some scientists continue pursuing the incredibly elusive promise of high-yielding jatropha. A comeback, they state, is reliant on splitting the yield problem and resolving the hazardous land-use issues intertwined with its original failure.
The sole staying large jatropha plantation is in Ghana. The plantation owner claims high-yield domesticated ranges have been accomplished and a new boom is at hand. But even if this resurgence fails, the world's experience of jatropha holds essential lessons for any promising up-and-coming biofuel.
At the beginning of the 21st century, Jatropha curcas, an unassuming shrub-like tree native to Central America, was planted throughout the world. The rush to jatropha was driven by its pledge as a sustainable source of biofuel that could be grown on deteriorated, unfertile lands so as not to displace food crops. But inflated claims of high yields fell flat.

Now, after years of research study and advancement, the sole staying big plantation concentrated on growing jatropha remains in Ghana. And Singapore-based jOil, which owns that plantation, claims the jatropha comeback is on.

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

Having learned from the mistakes of jatropha's past failures, he says the oily plant could yet play a key role as a liquid biofuel feedstock, reducing transport carbon emissions at the worldwide level. A new boom might bring additional benefits, with jatropha likewise a potential source of fertilizers and even bioplastics.

But some scientists are skeptical, keeping in mind that jatropha has currently gone through one hype-and-fizzle cycle. They caution that if the plant is to reach full capacity, then it is important to gain from past mistakes. During the first boom, jatropha plantations were hindered not only by poor yields, however by land grabbing, deforestation, and social issues in countries where it was planted, consisting of Ghana, where jOil runs.

Experts also recommend that jatropha's tale uses lessons for researchers and entrepreneurs exploring promising brand-new sources for liquid biofuels - which exist aplenty.

Miracle shrub, major bust

Jatropha's early 21st-century appeal originated from its pledge as a "second-generation" biofuel, which are sourced from turfs, trees and other plants not originated from edible crops such as maize, soy or oil palm. Among its multiple supposed virtues was a capability to thrive on abject or "minimal" lands; therefore, it was declared it would never ever compete with food crops, so the theory went.

Back then, jatropha ticked all packages, states Alexandros Gasparatos, now at the University of Tokyo's Institute for Future Initiatives. "We had a crop that seemed miraculous; that can grow without too much fertilizer, too numerous pesticides, or excessive need for water, that can be exported [as fuel] abroad, and does not take on food since it is harmful."

Governments, international companies, financiers and companies purchased into the buzz, releasing efforts to plant, or guarantee 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 amazing biofuel tree to fade.

In 2009, a Friends of the Earth report from Eswatini (still known at the time as Swaziland) cautioned that jatropha's high demands for land would undoubtedly bring it into direct dispute with food crops. By 2011, a worldwide review noted that "growing outmatched both scientific understanding of the crop's capacity along with an understanding of how the crop suits existing rural economies and the degree to which it can grow on limited 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 started to fail as anticipated yields refused to materialize. Jatropha might grow on abject lands and endure dry spell conditions, as declared, but yields remained poor.

"In my viewpoint, this mix of speculative financial investment, export-oriented potential, and potential to grow under fairly poorer conditions, created an extremely big problem," leading to "underestimated yields that were going to be produced," Gasparatos states.

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

Studies discovered that land-use modification for jatropha curcas in nations such as Brazil, Mexico and Tanzania led to a loss of biodiversity. A research study from Mexico found the "carbon repayment" of jatropha plantations due to associated forest loss varied between 2 and 14 years, and "in some circumstances, the carbon debt may never ever be recuperated." In India, production revealed carbon advantages, but making use of fertilizers resulted in boosts of soil and water "acidification, ecotoxicity, eutrophication."

"If you look at many of the plantations in Ghana, they claim that the jatropha produced was positioned on limited land, but the concept of marginal land is extremely evasive," describes Abubakari Ahmed, a lecturer at the University for Development Studies, Ghana. He studied the implications of jatropha plantations in the country over a number of years, and found that a lax definition of "marginal" suggested that presumptions that the land co-opted for jatropha plantations had actually been lying unblemished and unused was often illusory.

"Marginal to whom?" he asks. "The reality that ... presently nobody is using [land] for farming does not indicate that no one is utilizing it [for other functions] There are a great deal of nature-based incomes on those landscapes that you might not necessarily see from satellite imagery."

Learning from jatropha

There are crucial lessons to be discovered from the experience with jatropha, state analysts, which ought to be observed when considering other auspicious second-generation biofuels.

"There was a boom [in financial investment], however unfortunately not of research study, and action was taken based upon supposed advantages 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 hype was unwinding, Muys and colleagues released a paper mentioning essential lessons.

Fundamentally, he explains, there was an absence of understanding about the plant itself and its requirements. This essential requirement for in advance research could be used to other prospective biofuel crops, he says. In 2015, for instance, his team launched a paper evaluating the yields of pongamia (Millettia pinnata), a "fast-growing, leguminous and multipurpose tree species" with biofuel guarantee.

Like jatropha, pongamia can be grown on degraded and marginal land. But Muys's research study showed yields to be highly variable, contrary to other reports. The group concluded that "pongamia still can not be thought about a considerable and steady source of biofuel feedstock due to continuing knowledge gaps." Use of such cautionary data might prevent wasteful financial speculation and negligent land conversion for brand-new biofuels.

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

Gasparatos underlines important requirements that must be fulfilled before moving ahead with brand-new biofuel plantations: high yields must be unlocked, inputs to reach those yields comprehended, and an all set market must be readily available.

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

How biofuel lands are obtained is likewise essential, states Ahmed. Based on experiences in Ghana where communally used lands were acquired for production, authorities must guarantee that "guidelines are put in place to inspect how massive land acquisitions will be done and recorded in order to decrease some of the problems we observed."

A jatropha return?

Despite all these challenges, some scientists still think that under the ideal conditions, jatropha could be an important biofuel service - 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 right material, grown in the right 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 estimates, its use as a jet fuel might lead to about a 40% reduction of "cradle to tomb" emissions.

Alherbawi's team is performing ongoing field research studies to increase jatropha yields by fertilizing crops with sewage sludge. As an included advantage, he imagines a jatropha green belt covering 20,000 hectares (nearly 50,000 acres) in Qatar. "The implementation of the green belt can actually improve the soil and agricultural lands, and protect them versus any additional degeneration brought on by dust storms," he says.

But the Qatar project's success still depends upon lots of elements, not least the capability to get quality yields from the tree. Another crucial step, Alherbawi explains, is scaling up production technology that utilizes the whole of the jatropha curcas fruit to increase processing performance.

Back in Ghana, jOil is currently handling more than 1,300 hectares (1,830 acres) of jatropha curcas, and growing a pilot plot on 300 hectares (740 acres) working with more than 400 farmers. Subramanian describes that years of research and development have actually resulted in ranges of jatropha that can now attain the high yields that were doing not have more than a years ago.

"We were able to accelerate the yield cycle, improve the yield range and boost the fruit-bearing capacity of the tree," Subramanian states. In essence, he states, the tree is now domesticated. "Our very 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 alternative (important in Africa where much wood is still burned for cooking), and even bioplastics.

But it is the transport sector that still beckons as the ideal biofuels application, according to Subramanian. "The biofuels story has when again reopened with the energy shift drive for oil companies and bio-refiners - [driven by] the search for alternative fuels that would be emission friendly."

A total jatropha life-cycle evaluation has yet to be completed, however he believes that cradle-to-grave greenhouse gas emissions connected to the oily plant will be "competitive ... These 2 elements - that it is technically suitable, and the carbon sequestration - makes it a really strong candidate for adoption for ... sustainable air travel," he states. "We think any such expansion will happen, [by clarifying] the definition of degraded land, [permitting] no competitors with food crops, nor in any method threatening food security of any nation."

Where next for jatropha?

Whether jatropha can really be carbon neutral, environment-friendly and socially responsible depends upon complex factors, consisting of where and how it's grown - whether, for instance, its production design is based in smallholder farms versus industrial-scale plantations, say experts. 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 press that has stirred dispute over prospective consequences. The Gran Chaco's dry forest biome is already in deep trouble, having actually been heavily deforested by aggressive agribusiness practices.

Many previous plantations in Ghana, cautions Ahmed, converted dry savanna forest, which ended up being troublesome for carbon accounting. "The net carbon was typically unfavorable in many 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 "capacity of Jatropha curcas as an environmentally benign biodiesel feedstock" in Malaysia, Indonesia and India. But still other scientists remain skeptical of the environmental practicality 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 great deal of associated land-use modification," 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 actually performed research on the possibilities of jatropha contributing to a circular economy in Mexico.

Avila-Ortega mentions past land-use issues associated with expansion of various crops, including oil palm, sugarcane and avocado: "Our police is so weak that it can not handle the economic sector doing whatever they want, in regards to producing ecological problems."

Researchers in Mexico are currently checking out jatropha-based livestock feed as a low-priced and sustainable replacement for grain. Such usages might be well suited to local contexts, Avila-Ortega agrees, though he remains worried about potential environmental expenses.

He suggests limiting jatropha expansion in Mexico to make it a "crop that dominates land," growing it just in really poor soils in requirement of restoration. "Jatropha could be one of those plants that can grow in extremely sterilized wastelands," he describes. "That's the only method I would ever promote it in Mexico - as part of a forest recovery method for wastelands. Otherwise, the associated problems are higher than the possible benefits."

Jatropha's worldwide future stays unpredictable. And its potential as a tool in the fight versus climate modification can only be opened, say lots of specialists, by preventing the list of problems related to its very first boom.

Will jatropha projects that sputtered to a stop in the early 2000s be fired back up once again? Subramanian believes its role as a sustainable biofuel is "impending" and that the return is on. "We have strong interest from the energy market now," he says, "to collaborate 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).

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

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