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MFC

In Bamako we were treated to a great night out by Ibrahim Togola and his wife, who run MFC, a charity that is developing the use of Jatropha oil as a fuel source.

Jatropha is a weed which grows in very arid conditions, which means that it can be grown in areas where there has been no agriculture and its cultivation doesn't threaten food crops supply.

The challenge has been getting high oil yields out of jatropha grown in the desert. MFC are taking the ideal approach to the production of biofuels. It's small scale and its local. By local I mean they produce and use it locally, much like Ecotec, 5000 miles away in Preston .

From what I've learnt about biofuels over the last months and during this expedition, it's clear to me that biofuels can be part of a viable alternative to fossil fuels if they are produced and consumed locally, and if the consumers are conscious of the source material the fuels are made from.

MFC will use the Etruk 100 unit that we delivered to produce biodiesel locally and experiment with ways of increasing the scale of production.

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The Expedition set off from the UK on the 26th of November and arrived in Timbuktu on the 26th of December 2007.

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