SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
from the sugar-promotes-heart-disease dept.
Airlines are under pressure to reduce their carbon emissions, and are highly vulnerable to global oil price fluctuations. These challenges have spurred strong interest in biomass-derived jet fuels. Bio-jet fuel can be produced from various plant materials, including oil crops, sugar crops, starchy plants and lignocellulosic biomass, through various chemical and biological routes. However, the technologies to convert oil to jet fuel are at a more advanced stage of development and yield higher energy efficiency than other sources.
We are engineering sugarcane, the most productive plant in the world, to produce oil that can be turned into bio-jet fuel. In a recent study, we found that use of this engineered sugarcane could yield more than 2,500 liters of bio-jet fuel per acre of land. In simple terms, this means that a Boeing 747 could fly for 10 hours on bio-jet fuel produced on just 54 acres of land. Compared to two competing plant sources, soybeans and jatropha, lipidcane would produce about 15 and 13 times as much jet fuel per unit of land, respectively.
Maybe jet fuel is a better use of the world's sugar supply than eating it is...
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 22 2017, @11:09AM (7 children)
According to this page, [farmlandlp.com] one acre feeds a person for one year. And note that this is assuming an American diet.
So what do you think makes better use of the land, feeding 54 people for a year, or flying a Boeing 747 for 10 hours?
(Score: 2) by ledow on Wednesday November 22 2017, @11:11AM (2 children)
Depends if those 747s (or equivalent) are loaded with food imports really, doesn't it?
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Wednesday November 22 2017, @11:40PM (1 child)
The math works if it's loaded with 416 people who will have to eat whatever grows in a country 4 hours away.
Some journalist does need to remember that 747s are fuel hogs and being replaced by much more efficient planes.
(Score: 2) by realDonaldTrump on Thursday November 23 2017, @05:31PM
I'm getting two new 747-8s to replace the old 747-200s I'm using for Air Force One. I got a great deal on them because Aeroflot didn't take them. Obama ordered two very expensive 747-8s, I canceled that and got these instead. Dennis from Boeing found them, already built and sitting in the desert. Just sitting out there waiting!
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 22 2017, @07:48PM (2 children)
The ladder. Are you moral-fagging here because some dimwits in Africa have 12 kids they can't feed?
Maybe your starving Africans should kill more White people and take their farms... Oh what's that? The Evil White man took the Farm's Magic when he was killed? What an asshole. (Yes they actually fucking believe this).
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Wednesday November 22 2017, @08:07PM (1 child)
You want to make ladders out of sugarcane?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Osamabobama on Wednesday November 22 2017, @10:03PM
No, the ladder is a low-tech solution to the same problem solved by the (high-tech) 747: leaving the ground.
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 2) by t-3 on Wednesday November 22 2017, @10:06PM
Am acre is a very small amount of land. Productivity/acre can also vary greatly depending on crop, climate, and methods. Economics are what should be considered - is it viable to grow fuel rather than unsustainably drill for it?