BioFuel

Jatropha Oil Fuels Air New Zealand Flight

Filed under: Wings, Green

In February, Virgin Atlantic tried flying on a mix of 80% jet fuel and 20% biofuel made from coconut oil and babassu palm oil. Another exotic ingredient is behind Air New Zealand's biofuel flight. The airline used a 50-50 mix of jet fuel and jatropha tree oil in one of its four engines for the two-hour test flight on a Boeing 747. No modifications to the engine were needed. The flight was a success and Air New Zealand plans to source 10% of its fuel from sustainable sources by 2013.

The jatropha nut is a poisonous nut that is 30% oil and burns with a clear flame. It is seen to be at least as promising as palm oil as a potential biofuel and because it is drought resistant it has been used as live fencing in dry regions around the world.

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Tags: air new zealand, AirNewZealand, biofuel, jatropha

The Queen's $14 Million Bespoke Biofuel Bentleys

by Jared Paul Stern (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Wheels, Green

The Queen of England is having her two $14 million bespoke Bentley limousines converted to run on biofuels. Bentley will replace the 400 HP twin-turbo 6.75 liter V8 engines on the unique cars (above) by way of promoting the new range of eco-efficient models the famed marque plans to introduce by 2012, the London Daily Mail reports. The first of the Queen's one-off, supersized limousines, based on an ultra-luxe prototype and costing about $14 million to build, was a gift from Bentley on the occasion of her Golden Jubilee in 2002. Elizabeth II was so taken with it that she persuaded Bentley to build her another. "We have a lot of support from the Royal Family for our biofuel strategy," a Bentley exec tells the paper. "It is something about which they all take a keen interest." Prince Charles has already converted one of his Aston Martins to run on bio-ethanol made from surplus English wine, and has had his Jaguar, Audi and Range Rover converted to run on old cooking fat.

Tags: Bentley, Biofuel, British Royalty, BritishRoyalty, Limousine, Prince Charles, PrinceCharles, Queen of England, QueenOfEngland

Racecar Runs on Strongest Single Malt Ever Made

by Jared Paul Stern (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Wheels, Green

The folks at the beloved Bruichladdich Scotch distillery on Islay just powered a racecar from 0-60 in 3.5 seconds on a tank full of of its X4 Scotch, billed as the most alcoholic single malt ever made. The car, a British-made Radical SR4 (above), was driven by Top Gear's James May and wine expert Oz Clarke for a segment on their upcoming BBC series Oz and James' Great British Adventure. The clear 180-proof quadruple-distilled spirit, which required no engine modification, produced 200 bhp, only 5 less than ordinary gasoline - but at about $200 a gallon it's a pretty pricey biofuel. A lower proof version of the X4 will go on sale (for drinking, not driving) in the fall. You can see a video of the run here.

[via Men.Style]

Tags: BBC, biofuel, bruichladdich, Islay, Oz Clarke, OzClarke, Radical Sports Cars, RadicalSportsCars, Scotch, Scotland, single malt, SingleMalt

Virgin Atlantic Tries Flying On Coconut Oil

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Wings, Green

Last Sunday, Boeing, Virgin Atlantic and GE Aviation partnered up for the first commercial aviation flight using a sustainable fuel from biomass, mixed with traditional kerosene-based jet fuel. The Virgin Atlantic 747-400 flew using a biofuel blend of babassu oil and coconut oil provided by Seattle-based Imperium Renewables. The babassu nuts and coconuts used in the fuel were harvested from existing, mature plantations and no modifications were made to either the aircraft or its engines. Earlier this year an Airbus 380 flew using a synthetic liquid fuel processed from natural gas. Boeing is planning to use findings from this flight toward helping it plan another biofuel flight later this year with Air New Zealand.

Not everyone sees this first flight as a breakthrough. Wired covers some of the backlash; some environmentalists have called the flight a publicity stunt saying that Virgin is not interested in doing anything substantial toward reducing the airline industry's carbon footprint. Also, there is a growing controversy regarding the environmental benefits of biofuels since using these crops for fuel will drive up food costs and contribute to deforestation. Luckily Branson's got another trick up his sleeve. They are looking at algae as the next biofuel.

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Tags: biofuel, boeing, expire-images:2009-2-25, green, virgin atlantic, VirginAtlantic

The Ferrari F430 Spider Bio Fuel

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Wheels, Green

Fast high-end sports cars are generally not considered to be eco-friendly, with their gas guzzling turbo engines and energy-sucking luxury features. But that's not to say they aren't trying -- Ferrari for example, revealed their F430 Spider Bio Fuel model earlier this week in Detroit. It burns a mix of 85% natural ethanol and 15% gasoline, which results in +10hp (meaning its got a solid 500hp to work with) and a 5% increase in gas mileage over its gas-only counterpart. As for now the F430 Spider Bio Fuel is only a concept, but Ferrari says they'd like to put it into production as part of their efforts to cut emissions by 40% by the year 2012. Like the looks of it? See more photos here.

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Tags: auto, Bio Fuel, BioFuel, car, cars, eco, environment, F430, Ferrari, green, Spider, wheels

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