The Failure of Jatropha Biodiesel and the Opportunity of Calophyllum

Experience is the best teacher as the saying goes. And this also applies to biofuels. Don't let failures in the past happen again, because only fools fall into the same hole twice. The production of biodiesel from Jatropha (jatropha curcas) has been widely campaigned to become a national trending topic at that time, but in fact biodiesel from Jatropha is not economical or is still too expensive so the program stops automatically. One of these factors is the low oil yield from Jatropha seeds which is only around 25%, while calophyllum (Calophyllum inophyllum L) reaches an average of 50%. Moreover, the average productivity per hectare of Jatropha curcas is on average less than 10 tons/hectare, while calophyllum averages 10 tons/hectare. With the 50% yield with a productivity per hectare of more than 10 tons/hectare, the resulting calophyllum oil 5 tons of oil per hectare is more or less the same as crude palm oil CPO, making it more economical to produce. With a yield of about 25% with an average productivity of 20 tons/hectare of fresh fruit bunches (FFB), 5 tons of CPO will be produced, the same as calophyllum. Whereas palm oil is also the largest vegetable oil producing plant, so calophyllum oil is also not far from this condition.

 

Biofuel and especially biofuel from vegetable oils are classified as carbon neutral fuels, because they come from plants as a product of photosynthesis that requires CO2, so when burned it will also return the same amount of CO2 to the atmosphere. The use of carbon neutral fuels is very beneficial for the earth's atmosphere, thereby increasing greenhouse gases that increase the earth's temperature. Judging from the oil composition between jatropha oil, calophyllum oil and palm oil, it is also almost the same as the table above. Indeed, the two sources of biodiesel, both Jatropha and calophyllum, will both be carbon neutral fuels or more correctly carbon neutral liquid fuels, but the economic factor will ultimately determine the commercial production. Meanwhile, from the carbon neutral solid fuel group, we can find for example in wood chips, wood pellets, and palm kernel shells (PKS).

The advantages of calophyllum specifically as biodiesel raw material are first, calophyllum oil does not compete with food oil, secondly, this calophyllum plant grows and spreads evenly naturally in Indonesia, regenerates easily, bears fruit throughout the year and shows high survival power to the environment including with high-salinity soils along the coast. Third, the plant are relatively easy to cultivate, either monoculture or mixed culture, this makes a number of agroforestry practices possible. In palm oil plantation this is very difficult to do, so that we find today almost all palm oil plantations are monoculture or plantation of similar plant. Fourth, almost all parts of the plant can be utilized and have economic value, and fifth, the calophyllum plant stand can be useful as a wind breaker and conservation along the coast. Under these conditions, the opportunity for the development of calophyllum for biofuel is getting bigger.