21-08-2014, 02:58 PM
The energy crisis is a key issue raising the eyebrows of technocrats throughout the world. The gear is now self shifting from fossil fuel to alternative fuels to meet the energy needs of the growing population. Once the thought of growing diesel on the surface of the earth is now a reality with the bulls and bear of the markets investing in this proposition .For the last few years the word bio-diesel is receiving immense attention all around the globe. An alternate fuel source produced from edible and non-edible oils is under process.Concerning the advocacy of using food or non-food crops ,it cannot be denied that in a growing population like India demand for edible oil has always been to such an extent that around 30%-40% demand has been made through imports .Besides, the uncertainties in policies and feedstock availability is plaguing the growth of Indian bio-fuels industry. Thus, the bio-diesel program will have to look at large scale cultivation of an inedible feedstock for this purpose. Although, there are several key options ,India’s key to competitiveness in the global bio-diesel market is Jatropha Curcus .This is mainly due to the high seed yield at small incubation time .Jatropha is being described as the new pinup boy of renewable energy proponents.Presently, in a conference on ‘Green fuel: An eco-friendly fuel ` organized by FICCI western region council in Mumbai the idea of public-private partnerships(PPP) in Jatropha cultivation was proposed.Out of the total cost of bio-diesel produced from Jatropha curcus , investors proclaim that about 78% of the production cost is that of the feedstock.
Next problem associated with generation of bio-diesel from Jatropha Curcas is a high pre-treatment cost due to 14%FFA content which is no way close to the 0.1% FFA content of ASTM.Besides, all these problems , the high cost investment for the trans-esterification plant cannot be ignored.Previously,crude glycerine , by-product of bio-diesel had a market value of US$1/lb in 2003 and not it has gone down heavily.With the government of India marking the price ofbio-diesel to 26.50/litre it has become difficult for entrepreneurs to meet profit at the same time maintain the quality of fuel.The present paper tries to provide a solution to the problem through a life cycle assessment (LCA) by considering an integrated process(from cultivation to transesterification)employing heterogeneous acid catalysis as a measure to combat the high production cost of bio-diesel.