POTENTIAL OF COTTON SEED OIL AND RICE BRAN OIL AS A RENEWABLE ENERGY SOURCE IN INDIA

The transportation, agricultural and power sector of India is largely dependent on fossil fuels that decrease day by day. The government has to import large volumes of fuel from foreign sources to meet the fuel demand for power production, causing a negative impact on the country's economy. Biodiesel can thus be a destined source to future energy demands. Increasing the usage of biodiesel will also decrease the global problem of environmental pollution, as fossil fuels are considered to be the major source of harmful emissions. In a developing country like India this is not practically feasible to divert the edible oil for production of Biodiesel as the edible oil demand for human consumption is always higher than its domestic production. Under Indian climatic conditions only few plant sources can be considered for biodiesel production which produces non-edible oil in greater quantity and can be cultivated at large scale on non-cropped marginal and wastelands. In this study the available potential of cotton seed oil and rice bran oil biodiesel feed stocks, comparison of cost analysis are discussed. Producing biodiesel from cotton seed oil and rice bran oil feed stocks is greatly possible, cost-effectiveness and availability of biodiesel needs to be carried out to help ensure that biodiesel will be able to fully replace fossil fuel and can thus assist in future energy needs