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It's bad enough for some propeller planes to be described as being powered by rubber bands. Now the skeptics might begin having a dig at commercial aircraft flying on everything from cooking oil to liquefied algae.

With the civil aviation market under increasing pressure from rising oil costs and ecological legislation, the race is on to discover viable options to standard kerosene and these so far appear to boil down to different kinds of biofuel.

Not surprisingly, the first trials of alternative fuel were initiated by British aviation leader, Sir Richard Branson, whose Virgin Atlantic began London to Amsterdam flights with restricted biofuel usage in 2008. This was rapidly followed by Lufthansa and Air New Zealand who each used various blends of regular fuel and bio derivatives consisting of some from made from jatropha which can grow in soil thought about too bad for growing mainstream foodstuffs.

Jatropha is a genus of approximately 175 succulent plants, shrubs and trees (some are deciduous, like Jatropha curcas), from the family Euphorbiaceae.

In 2007 Goldman Sachs mentioned Jatropha curcas as one of the best candidates for future biodiesel production. It is resistant to drought and insects, and produces seeds including 27-40% oil.

Recently, US aerospace giant Boeing, Brazilian aerial significant Embraer and the Sao Paulo state Research Support Foundation relocated to bring out research and development into making use of biofuels to power jet airliners. It was reported that Brazilian airline companies Azul, Gol, TAM and Trip would function as strategic consultants for the task.

The current airline company to start try out new fuels is the Alaska Air Group which has carried out internal US using a mix of 80 % petroleum based fuel and 20% biofuel made from cooking oil. This mix, it is claimed, can cut harmful emissions by 10%.

One actually motivating advancement has actually been the move far from biofuels which complete head on with food consumers thus avoiding a rate spiral. Not so long ago, a surge in usage of biofuels in vehicles caused a spike in maize prices as US farmers diverted too much corn to fuel processing.

Hopefully in the future, airlines and vehicle drivers will focus biofuel usage on non-food sources such as jatropha and algae. It would be a mixed true blessing indeed if some individuals ended up starving just to satisfy another person's green qualifications.