New Biofuel Source! It Will Save the World!

Yes, I am being sarcastic. I am tired of every new biofuels source being proclaimed as the savior of the oil crisis.
However, this story does contain some good elements for showing how new ideas can improve on old mantras. Mainly, if you can get a better biofuels plant, you can get a better biofuel.
Jatropha curcas is a plant from the tropics and has many useful properties for the biofuels market. It is also used by low income farmers in the tropics for fuel in their lanterns. This alone should make people take notice, as if it wasn't efficient, the farmers would not use it.
Positive aspects of the plant include:

• A 50 year life span for reduced planting costs.
  
• Drought resistance to lower watering needs
• Can grow in sandy soil, expanding growing area into otherwise marginal crop lands.
• Yields up to 10 times more usable fuel per acre than our current savior, corn.
  

This plant seem to have many reasons to be considered a savior of the biofuels camp. One small problem for the United States is that it prefers to grow in tropical and subtropical settings, limiting the growing area inside of the country. It is possible the hydroponics and green houses could enlarge the growing regions.
While I am not ready to jump on the bandwagon and call this plant a miracle, it is a promising step in a better direction than corn. Maybe some selective breeding will produce higher yields and more tolerate plants. Biofuels is promising, but lets not start swearing of the black stuff just yet.
We still have quite a ways to go, and lot more plants to grow.