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Earlier this century, jatropha was hailed as a "wonder" biofuel. An unassuming shrubby tree native to Central America, it was wildly promoted as a high-yielding, drought-tolerant biofuel feedstock that could grow on degraded lands across 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 led to plantation failures nearly all over. The after-effects of the jatropha crash was polluted by accusations of land grabbing, mismanagement, and overblown carbon decrease claims.
Today, some scientists continue pursuing the incredibly elusive guarantee of high-yielding jatropha. A comeback, they state, depends on breaking the yield issue and dealing with the hazardous land-use problems intertwined with its initial failure.
The sole staying large jatropha plantation is in Ghana. The plantation owner claims high-yield domesticated varieties have actually been achieved and a new boom is at hand. But even if this comeback falters, the world's experience of jatropha holds essential lessons for any appealing up-and-coming biofuel.
At the start of the 21st century, Jatropha curcas, a simple shrub-like tree native to Central America, was planted across the world. The rush to jatropha was driven by its promise as a sustainable source of biofuel that might be grown on broken down, unfertile lands so as not to displace food crops. But inflated claims of high yields failed.
Now, after years of research and advancement, the sole staying large plantation focused on growing jatropha is in Ghana. And Singapore-based jOil, which owns that plantation, declares the jatropha comeback is on.
"All those business that failed, adopted a plug-and-play design of hunting for the wild ranges of jatropha. But to advertise it, you require to domesticate it. This belongs of the process that was missed out on [throughout the boom]," jOil CEO Vasanth Subramanian told Mongabay in an interview.
Having discovered from the errors of jatropha's past failures, he states the oily plant might yet play a key role as a liquid biofuel feedstock, decreasing transport carbon emissions at the international level. A brand-new boom could bring fringe benefits, with jatropha also a potential source of fertilizers and even bioplastics.
But some scientists are doubtful, noting that jatropha has already 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 previous mistakes. During the very first boom, jatropha plantations were hampered not just by bad yields, however by land grabbing, logging, and social issues in countries where it was planted, including Ghana, where jOil operates.
Experts also recommend that jatropha's tale provides lessons for scientists and business owners checking out promising new sources for liquid biofuels - which exist aplenty.
Miracle shrub, significant bust
Jatropha's early 21st-century appeal stemmed from its guarantee 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 several supposed virtues was a capability to prosper on degraded or "limited" lands; therefore, it was declared it would never ever take on 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 appeared incredible; that can grow without excessive fertilizer, too lots of pesticides, or excessive demand for water, that can be exported [as fuel] abroad, and does not compete with food due to the fact that it is toxic."
Governments, worldwide companies, investors and companies purchased into the hype, releasing initiatives to plant, or guarantee 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 understood at the time as Swaziland) warned that jatropha's high demands for land would undoubtedly bring it into direct conflict with food crops. By 2011, an international review kept in mind that "cultivation outpaced 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 flourish on minimal 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 stop working as expected yields declined to materialize. Jatropha could grow on abject lands and tolerate drought conditions, as claimed, however yields remained poor.
"In my viewpoint, this mix of speculative financial investment, export-oriented capacity, and potential to grow under relatively poorer conditions, produced a huge problem," resulting in "ignored yields that were going to be produced," Gasparatos says.
As jatropha plantations went from boom to bust, they were also plagued by environmental, social and economic problems, state professionals. Accusations of land grabs, the conversion of food crop lands, and cleaning of natural areas were reported.
Studies discovered that land-use change for jatropha in nations such as Brazil, Mexico and Tanzania led to a loss of biodiversity. A research study from Mexico discovered the "carbon repayment" of jatropha plantations due to associated forest loss ranged in between two and 14 years, and "in some scenarios, the carbon debt might never be recuperated." In India, production revealed carbon advantages, but making use of fertilizers led to boosts of soil and water "acidification, ecotoxicity, eutrophication."
"If you take a look at many of the plantations in Ghana, they declare that the jatropha produced was located on limited land, but the idea of limited 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 country over a number of years, and discovered that a lax definition of "marginal" indicated that presumptions that the land co-opted for jatropha plantations had been lying untouched and unused was typically illusory.
"Marginal to whom?" he asks. "The fact that ... currently nobody is using [land] for farming doesn't suggest that nobody is using it [for other functions] There are a lot of nature-based livelihoods on those landscapes that you may not necessarily see from satellite images."
Learning from jatropha
There are key lessons to be learned from the experience with jatropha, say experts, which should be heeded when thinking about other advantageous second-generation biofuels.
"There was a boom [in investment], but sadly not of research, 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 buzz was winding down, Muys and coworkers released a paper pointing out essential lessons.
Fundamentally, he discusses, there was a lack of knowledge about the plant itself and its needs. This crucial requirement for in advance research study could be applied to other prospective biofuel crops, he states. In 2015, for example, his group released a paper examining the yields of pongamia (Millettia pinnata), a "fast-growing, leguminous and multipurpose tree species" with biofuel promise.
Like jatropha, pongamia can be grown on degraded and minimal land. But Muys's research study revealed yields to be highly variable, contrary to other reports. The group concluded that "pongamia still can not be thought about a substantial and stable source of biofuel feedstock due to persisting knowledge spaces." Use of such cautionary data could avoid wasteful financial speculation and negligent land conversion for new biofuels.
"There are other extremely appealing trees or plants that might work as a fuel or a biomass producer," Muys states. "We wished to prevent [them going] in the exact same direction of early hype and stop working, like jatropha."
Gasparatos underlines essential requirements that need to be met before continuing with brand-new biofuel plantations: high yields must be opened, inputs to reach those yields comprehended, and a prepared 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 says. Jatropha "was practically undomesticated when it was promoted, which was so weird."
How biofuel lands are acquired is also crucial, says Ahmed. Based on experiences in Ghana where communally utilized lands were acquired for production, authorities should make sure that "standards are put in place to check how large-scale land acquisitions will be done and documented in order to reduce a few of the issues we observed."
A jatropha resurgence?
Despite all these difficulties, some scientists still think that under the ideal conditions, jatropha might be an important biofuel option - especially for the difficult-to-decarbonize transport sector "responsible for approximately one quarter of greenhouse gas emissions."
"I think jatropha has some potential, but it requires to be the right product, grown in the right location, 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 might lower airline company carbon emissions. According to his estimates, its use as a jet fuel might result in about a 40% decrease of "cradle to grave" emissions.
Alherbawi's team is carrying out ongoing field studies to improve jatropha yields by fertilizing crops with sewage sludge. As an included benefit, he envisages a jatropha green belt spanning 20,000 hectares (almost 50,000 acres) in Qatar. "The application of the green belt can actually enhance the soil and agricultural lands, and secure them against any further degeneration triggered by dust storms," he states.
But the Qatar task's success still depends upon lots of elements, not least the ability to acquire quality yields from the tree. Another vital step, Alherbawi describes, is scaling up production innovation that uses the entirety of the jatropha fruit to increase processing effectiveness.
Back in Ghana, jOil is presently 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 describes that years of research and development have actually resulted in varieties of jatropha that can now attain the high yields that were lacking more than a decade earlier.
"We had the ability to quicken the yield cycle, improve the yield variety and improve the fruit-bearing capability of the tree," Subramanian states. In essence, he states, the tree is now domesticated. "Our very first project 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 might 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 perfect biofuels application, according to Subramanian. "The biofuels story has as soon as again reopened with the energy shift drive for oil business 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 appropriate, and the carbon sequestration - makes it a very strong candidate for adoption for ... sustainable air travel," he states. "We think any such growth will happen, [by clarifying] the definition of abject land, [permitting] no competition with food crops, nor in any method threatening food security of any country."
Where next for jatropha?
Whether jatropha can really be carbon neutral, environment-friendly and socially accountable depends upon intricate aspects, including where and how it's grown - whether, for example, its production design is based in smallholder farms versus industrial-scale plantations, state specialists. Then there's the bothersome issue of accomplishing 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 press that has stirred argument over potential effects. The Gran Chaco's dry forest biome is already in deep difficulty, having actually been heavily deforested by aggressive agribusiness practices.
Many previous plantations in Ghana, cautions Ahmed, transformed dry savanna woodland, which ended up being troublesome for carbon accounting. "The net carbon was often unfavorable in the majority of the jatropha sites, since the carbon sequestration of jatropha can not be compared to that of a shea tree," he describes.
Other scientists chronicle the "potential of Jatropha curcas as an ecologically benign biodiesel feedstock" in Malaysia, Indonesia and India. But still other scientists remain uncertain of the environmental viability of second-generation biofuels. "If Mexico promotes biofuels, such as the exploitation of jatropha, the rebound is that it possibly becomes 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. trainee with the Stockholm Resilience Centre; he has actually carried out research study on the possibilities of jatropha contributing to a circular economy in Mexico.
Avila-Ortega cites previous land-use problems associated with expansion of various crops, consisting of oil palm, sugarcane and avocado: "Our police is so weak that it can not manage the economic sector doing whatever they desire, in terms of developing environmental problems."
Researchers in Mexico are currently checking out jatropha-based animals feed as an inexpensive and sustainable replacement for grain. Such usages may be well suited to regional contexts, Avila-Ortega agrees, though he stays concerned about potential environmental costs.
He suggests limiting jatropha growth in Mexico to make it a "crop that dominates land," growing it only in genuinely poor soils in need of restoration. "Jatropha could be among those plants that can grow in extremely sterile wastelands," he describes. "That's the only way I would ever promote it in Mexico - as part of a forest recovery method for wastelands. Otherwise, the associated issues are higher than the possible benefits."
Jatropha's global future stays unpredictable. And its possible as a tool in the battle against environment change can just be unlocked, state lots of professionals, by preventing the list of troubles associated with its first boom.
Will jatropha tasks that sputtered to a stop in the early 2000s be fired back up again? Subramanian believes its role as a sustainable biofuel is "impending" which the return is on. "We have strong interest from the energy market now," he says, "to work together with us to develop and broaden 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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