[Stoves] Jatropha and its future

Crispin Pemberton-Pigott crispinpigott at gmail.com
Sun Aug 7 22:33:28 CDT 2011


Dear Dr AD

I was under the impression that the castor oil had to be de-toxified at some
level. There is a product called Covo Oil, a castor cooking oil, that has
been treated, we were told. Not so?

Interesting. The article I linked says in a couple of places that Jatropha
has not been 'domesticated' with the result that the yields are erratic.
Strange, that.

I can't think of anything close to those oil yields. The best I know of for
sunflower is 49% variety but it is not a high mass one.  The heavier
yielding have 47% so more total oil but still, 2 tons would be good on dry
land.

I take it that the castor is not irrigated, correct?

The cake is 50% of the crop so 2.5 tons gives how much biogas? And how much
'leftovers'?

Thanks
Crispin

 
-----Original Message-----

Dear Crispin,
we have in India castor hybrids that can yield upto 5 tons of seed or
2.5 ton oil per ha. Only Malaysian oil palm can outyield hybrid castor.
Castor oil acts as a purgative if one gulps it directly, but if used in
cooking or frying, whereby it gets mixed with other type of food, it loses
its purgative effect and it is digested by the human system like any other
vegetable oil. Castor oilcake is however highly toxic because of the
presence of ricin in it, but it is a great feedstock for producing biogas.
Yours
A.D.Karve





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