Jatropha biofuels nursery established

Pure Biofuels Corp., a Peruvian-based biodiesel corporation, recently announced that it has established a Jatropha nursery, which will produce an initial 360,000 plants in approximately two months, scaling up to one million plants per month.

The first yield of oil, which the company is going to use as feedstock for biodiesel production, is expected in less than a year.

Pure Biofuels’ Chairman Chris Tewell, states, “The establishment of a Jatropha nursery is another significant milestone in our growth strategy. We believe that becoming a self-supplier of feedstock is one of our competitive differentiators and protects us from commodity price fluctuations. Importantly, our Jatropha plantation will provide development to adjacent rural communities, creating more than 10,000 jobs. We are very pleased to commence cultivating our own feedstock with the target of satisfying our full-scale biodiesel feedstock needs in the years ahead.”

Jatropha is one of the lowest cost feedstock sources for production of biodiesel. It is a non-food plant that is easy to grow, even on wastelands. It yields more than 2.5 metric tons of non-edible oil per hectare per year, according to the company. Pure Biofuels plans to plant its crops on marginal land that is unsuitable for cultivating food crops. The company intends to ramp up to a planting a rate of 1,000 hectares per month and expects 80 percent of its feedstock will be derived from its local Jatropha plantation by 2015.

For more information, visit www.purebiofuels.com.