As soon as biofuels can be produced sanely, it won't take long for us to use all we can produce. Today's biofuels (corn, palm farmed from cut rainforests) are bad choices. The research money would have been *much* better spent researching algae or other possible sources of new energy, rather than having aircraft join the competition with autos and hungry people and maintaining soil by not overfarming for TODAY's inefficient biofuels, just so you can feel better about flying but without a new postivie impact. Unless Branson intends to go door to door collecting waste fryer oil.

Stephen Cataldo, Oakland,

Why does everyone believe that biofuels only come from crop feedstocks. There are other sources such as algae, forest thinning residues, solid waste, newspaper. Everyone uses that same lame argument of food vs fuel. Do some research first before you start shooting down new, innovative ideas.
Besides, do you have any suggestions?!

Daniel Montaño, Belen, USA, New Mexico

With all the percentages and arguments for and against climate change being thrown around and the use of agricultural land being wasted for the production of energy instead of food, we as humans should be looking at the root of the energy supply problem. Overpopulation. The more people we are the more energy we need globally. So lets concentrate heavily on overpopulation first BUT continue to look for energy alternatives as we know that our fossil fuel days are numbered. So, well done to Virgin for taking a step in the right direction.

Claus Hoffmann, Johannesburg, South Africa

It's nice to see companies at least striving towards alternatives. I see that there are issues with biofuels, but does that mean we should be twiddling our thumbs while the world spirals down into a climate change disaster?

I'm not sure if this is innovation or marketing or both, but at least I can be happy that the Green movement's muscle flexing is having an effect.

With the <a href="http://liveearth.spaces.live.com">Live Earth</a> concerts this summer, hopefully these kinds of changes will increase!

zack k, Melbourne, Australia

Since I only read the headlines,

Why is the pilot of this aircraft described as a 'Virgin"? What's that got to do with the experiment?

Dick, Eugene, OR,

Hmmm.....technology not expected to be ready for 5 years, not expected to be as useful for aeroplanes and then noted self publicist R Branson makes big splash that his airline will do it first (except it won't happen for several years if at all)?

G, Leicester, UK

My understanding is that the only reason biofuels are cost competitive is because of government subsidies. There was an article in the local paper a few days ago about how much the price of hay for dairy has risen because farmers are growing corn for bio instead of hay for livestock. So local gas today is hovering around $3.00 and watch where your food costs go in the near future. Your taxes subsidizing bio fuel, $3.00 plus gas, increased prices for food, more use of fuel to farm with for more corn for bio. fuel. Where is the benefit? I say throw those tax dollars into building nuclear electricity plants and research on batteries for electric cars. Give me a cost competative electric car with a 200 mile range and I can do at least 50% and probably 75% or more of my transportation needs with that and leave the gas guzzler for extended trips and recreation.

keith heil, willard, utah

Great idea, in a world where vast numbers of the burgeoning population wont know how to feed themselves we are effectively running jumbo jets on food!

AG, COLCHESTER, UK

Rock 'n Roll Sir Richard, great technology break through

DAVID KOKKE, Wodonga, Australia

Biofuels do not cut CO2 emissions, they simply recycle the CO2 present in the biosystems, while in fact the growing, fertilising, irrigating, harvesting, shipping and refining of biofuels are as inefficient if not more so and as CO2-emitting as with fossil fuels.
But for God's sake, this is to use agricultural land and burn crops when climate change is already putting output of these at threat. The poor of the world, in their billions, are giong to find it increasingly hard to feed themselves without finding they're priced out of the grain markets, KNOWING it's due to supplies being burned in machines elsewhere.
There are already food riots in Mexico over corn prices rocketing due to the demands of ethanol in the US.
The backlash is beginning and for Beardy to pretend he's going oh-so Green and world-loving by having his massive tourist buses powered on food just beggars belief.

Robin Tudge, London,

What with so many farmers in the EC being subsidised NOT to grow anything I would have thought that crops for biofuels would have been a good solution. Maybe I'm wrong?

Darcy, London,

A 2-3% reduction in carbon emissions by the aircraft industry will result in exactly 0% percent drop in the global temperature. This is due to the fact that CO2 has no link with global warming.

Ricky Wilson, Leeds, UK

Whether the experiment succeeds or not (we may, after all, end up flying in rocket liners is an extra oxidant is needed!), this is exactly the kind of thing we need. Sir Richard has grasped that if we rely on politicians simply asking people to change their lifestyles, nothing will happen.

I hope Rolls Royce is also engaged in early experimentation on such an important technology.

Ian Kemmish, Biggleswade, UK

The world's top food and agriculture experts (FAO) have just concluded, after a three day session on bioenergy and biofuels, that biofuels can boost rural development in poor countries.

http://biopact.com/2007/04/fao-and-un-experts-agree-biofuels-can.html

Moreover, these countries have a huge potential to grown biofuels in a sustainable manner. According to the top energy experts of the IEA, Africa and Latin America alone can supply 750EJ of energy in the form of biofuels, without threatening food security or forests. This amount is almost twice the amount of all the energy the entire world currently consumes (400EJ) from all sources (coal, natural gas, nuclear...).

http://biopact.com/2006/07/look-at-africas-biofuels-potential.html

Clearly, biofuels are possbly the solution to solving both climate change and world poverty.

Jonas Van Den Berg, Brussels, Belgium

Brilliant for a single aircraft.

And the BioFuel for the rest of the industry is going to come from?

Mike Bibby, St Albans, England -not EU

We should be wary of the "free market" exploiting our environmental concerns here. While undoubtedly a worthy cause, there are few fuels with the energy density (energy released per kg of fuel) of avgas. Lower energy densities require more fuel, and hence heavier aircraft at take-off - this is somewhat counter-productive.

More importantly, it is necessary to realise that in order to replace something like 10-15% of the fuel required just by airlines in the USA with biofuels would require turning an area the size of Florida into a field - really. Multiply that by all of the aircraft operating in the world, and increasing the proportion of biofuels used, and you begin to realise just how much our economies will have to change, along with, say, turning France into a gigantic field. Don't pin your hopes on it. Try travelling less, too.

Stuart, Worthing, UK

Airliner "biofuel" is no creature of the free market but of companies running terrified and imagining state regulators can and should be appeased. The fuel surcharge is already here and more curbs are discussed daily. If human beings have any sense of independence they will eventually see through the green scam and refused to be pushed around any more.

Patrick Rioux, Frankfurt, Germany

Gareth - I believe they're looking at using the waste cellulose matter from agriculture for fuel manufacture - were you unaware of this development? That they don't necessarily take away from food acreage, and that your second point is just plain dumb!!

Andy, London, UK

Congratulations Mr. Branson, you really are excellent when it comes to publicity stunts.

You can rest assured that I won't be flying in any of your experimental (or non-experimental for that matter) aircraft, thank you.

JimBob, Stavanger,

John, you miss the point. It is not so much about climate change gases as lack of resources. If you want to fly somewhere in 20 years time, you'd better hope this biofuel works, because if not, there will be a serious lack of Jet A1 to go round. (Air travel growth is predicted to climb exponentially, whilst fuel output will grow only very slightly (lack of refineries, lack of crude supply)).

ab, exeter, cornwall

Finding a bio replacement for Jet A1 is notoriously difficult. Jet fuel is tested extremely stringently for over 20 characteristics, and has to be able to not freeze at -50'C, but also not blow up above 38'C. This is a tough call for a bio fuel, but doubtless it can be done and good on Virgin for pushing it forward. Next problem will be logisitics - airports are fed by dedicated pipelines, and you cannot mix Jet A1 with ANYTHING. So you would have to truck in the biofuel, until everyone converted.

ab, exeter, cornwall

Biofuels are not "green". I think they are a distraction.

Biodiesel from palm oil will require the indonesian rainforest to be chopped down. That is not green. Current palm production is already threatening orang-utan habitats.

It takes more energy to make ethanol from corn than proiduced when it is used as a fuel. It is "unsustainable, inefficient food buring."

It all sounds like a global panacea to our enery problems, but I ask the question how "green" is "green". In this case, not very...

Garry White, London,

This is not a solution, just a displacement of the problem. Biofuels for aviation will outbid poor people for food, increasing starvation and increasing pressure on biodiversity. Tim Joslin is also right to point out that jet flights in the upper atmosphere cause at least double the climate impacts relative to their carbon release.

There's a much simpler and more effective answer: only fly when it's really necessary. If we really can't live without stag nights in Prague and golfing weekends in the Algarve (and most UK aviation growth is that kind of thing), go by train.

Roger Levett, Bristol, UK

David Strahan's "The Last Oil Shock: A Survival Guide to the Imminent Extinction of Petroleum Man" includes an assessment of the potential of biofuels to replace oil in transport. Suffice to say, that there is unlikely to be enough to go round if we also want people to eat.

On the other hand, we shall clearly want to maintain some flying in a post-oil/ post-carbon world, so this is technology worth having. What we will need to do, however, is to think carefully about our priorities in the use of the productive land available, especially if this area is falling due to climate change.

Nothing forseeable that replaces oil, which comes at little effort with huge energy potential, will give us such simple and cheap access to high energy use.

John, Edinburgh, Scotland

Please do not be so misleading. Man made greenhouse gases are only a fraction of the total. Water vaper is the greatest, followed by CO2. Of this CO2 gas, man only contributs a small fraction. Of which planes only contribute about 2% of this small fraction.

m.Wallace, breuil barret, france

bet you still have to pay full air passenger duty irrespecive of whatever the aircraft is running on.

ray, Soton, uk

To replace 10-15% of the fuel used by airlines just in the USA will require a field the size of Florida. Many fuels do not provide the energy density (energy/kg of fuel) that avgas does, so other fuels will require heavier planes at take off. In aviation, this could be counter-productive. Multiply this amount of land usage by all air travel, and for a higher proportion of bio-fuel, and you see a big problem. Other practical suggestions would be to cut energy-consuming devices like all the entertainment screens (also weight-saving), and restricting the amount of luggage (how many people do you see struggling with excessively large cases?). Also, air traffic control could reduce the amount of holding. We could also travel less! (I know that's a bit of a wild suggestion).

Don't rely on airframes and engines to make huge inroads in the near future. Manufacturers are working as hard as they can, but the gains are small, and not rapid

Stuart, Worthing, UK

The only problems are:
(1) Large-scale biofuel production is an environmental (and food supply) disaster and is increasing global CO2 emissions, for example due to rainforest clearing - check out the Biofuelwatch website.
(2) Burning fuel at altitude is 2 to 3 times more damaging than burning it at ground level. Aircraft emissions therefore cause more warming than is avoided by growing plants to make fuel so they can't become "carbon-neutral" by using biofuel.

Tim Joslin, Cambridge, UK

Having options is always a good thing. But there is a limit to how much biofuel can be sustainably produced - and it's probably quite low (the highest estimate I've seen is 10% of our current transport fuel use). The carbon benefits of biofuel from most sources are not huge anyway, with re-used chip fat, locally grown rapeseed and sugarcane leading the way as feedstocks, and Malaysian palm oil and US corn providing questionable advantages.

We're still going to have to cut down on fuel use quite drastically overall to get independence from finite resources, which means a whole lot less flying and driving, wherever we get the fuel from. Perhaps this development means that my grandchildren will be able to fly once or twice in a lifetime.

Pav, London,

The vast majority of climate change gases in the atmosphere came
from nature not man.----------------------NOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ted, jinan,

This is excellent news; a 2-3 percent reduction in carbon emissions by the aircraft industry will go a long way to proove that we need to get away from our reliance on oil. Bio fuels are a major step toward this goal. The increase in severe weather incidents are just the tip of the iceburg. ( take pictures before they dissappear) A brave move Mr Branson you have my full support, and I will use Virgin for my long haul flights to the UK in August. ( I am in China)

David Morgan, Huizhou, China

Biofuels don't work. I wish governments and companies would do feasibility studies on this product.

There are two main problems with biofuels, one is that they are taking away much of the land once used to grow food. We take this away, commodity prices will rise and we won't be able to sustain a growing population. The second problem is that it takes more energy to produce biofuels, and the energy to create biofuels comes from oil. What a stupid idea to start and convert all machines to biofuels.

It is not sustainable, and we must start looking at other forms of fuel. For example, improving battery technology.

gareth, Seoul, S Korea

I think I'll fly Virgin the next time I go to the States.

Well Done Sir Richard.

Spinn Inghed, Devon, UK

Air travel contributes 2 to 3% of MAN MADE climate change
gases which in turn are about 1% of the total. The vast
majority of climate change gases in the atmosphere came
from nature not man.

John, LONDON, ENGLAND

A great example of the private sector leading in innovation without government regulations or prodding. The free market works!

Scott Wright, Rochester, MN USA

It is a very good news for human being~~~

Johnny Lin, Zhangzhou, China

Isn't this PR? Where is all the land going to come from to produde the organic source for this? I genuinely hope that someone will give me an answer that says how this will, because, of the surface, it's admirable, but, what is the environmental cost of producing this fuel?

Geoff, Falkirk,