Jatropha has been planted across Asia in countries under pressure from the West to reduce emissions from the destruction of rainforests, car exhausts and energy production from coal-burning power plants.

But the study for the anti-poverty agency ActionAid and the RSPB of a proposed 50,000 hectare jatropha plantation development in the Dakatcha woodlands of Kenya, near Malindi, found that emissions in producing the biofuel would be 2.5 to six times higher than the fossil fuel equivalents. The woodland hosts globally endangered bird life.

A couple of years ago, as food prices soared in response to farmers diverting land to biofuels, it was argued that so-called "second generation biofuels", including jatropha, would provide an answer, because they used marginal land not required for food production.

Back to the drawing board then...