The Hindu : Plan to boost bio-alternative to diesel

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Jun 08, 2003

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Plan to boost bio-alternative to diesel

By P. Sunderarajan

NEW DELHI June 7. After introducing ethanol-blended petrol in selected States, the Centre has now drawn up a Rs.1,430 crore plan to make use of oil from the seeds of the jatropha plant as a bio-alternative to diesel.

The plan, which is to be implemented with a mission mode approach, is expected to generate six lakh tonnes of diesel-quality oil valued at Rs. 1,020 crores per annum at the end of a gestation period of four years.

Disclosing details of the plan, sources in the Union Agriculture Ministry said that for the purpose of the project, jatropha plantations would be raised in an area of four lakh hectares spread over eight States — Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and Chhattisgarh.

The National Oilseeds and Vegetable Oils Development (NOVOD) Board under the Ministry, which would be implementing the programme, has already taken several preparatory steps. Among other things, it has developed high-performing varieties of the plant or what are technically called elite planting material and has raised nurseries using them in different States.

Though jatropha oil has been used as a diesel substitute in several countries, including Austria and Nicaragua, it has also been tested here to assess its efficacy under Indian conditions.

The tests conducted at IIT, Delhi, CSIR's Indian Institute of Petroleum at Dehradun and Punjab Agriculture University, Ludhiana, have proved successful.

Besides, a pilot plant of one tonne per day capacity for transesterification or conversion of the crude oil from the seeds to commercially useful fuel has been successfully fabricated by scientists at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore in collaboration with a private fabricator in Shimoga.

The plantations would have a life span of 45 years, and consequently, the investment of Rs. 1,430 crores over the next four years is expected to get a return of Rs. 46,000 crores.

The Ministry sources noted that apart from helping the country to reduce the outflow of foreign exchange by cutting down on import of crude petroleum and being a rich source of revenue, the programme would also serve to generate a new avenue of rural employment.

The project is expected to generate 1,200 lakh mandays of employment per year during the first four years, when the plantations would be raised, and thereafter 160 lakh mandays of jobs per year towards collection of seeds.

In addition, it would help in providing green cover to large tracts of wasteland as jatropha is a hardy plant, which could be grown on any type of soil, and under any agro-climatic condition.

It also grew very fast, required minimal care, and is easy to propagate through seed or cuttings.

Further, it is not grazed by animals even during times of drought.

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