Abstract: Nowadays, the whole world is facing the problems of lack of fossil fuels and the rise of emission level in automobiles like carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide etc. In order to prevent the whole world from these problems, a number of research developments are taking place to change the concept of using only fossil fuels by displaying some new alternative fuels to the market so that this dependence on fossil fuels can be reduced. For most of the countries in the world, there are limitations of petroleum-based fuels. In other words, the petroleum-based reserves are limited to certain countries. Therefore, those countries which are totally dependent on import of crude oil have to go through many crises or intense difficulties. Hence it becomes very important to develop some alternative fuels, which could be easily obtained from many available resources like vegetables etc. Biodiesel is nowadays considered as the most effective, renewable and environmentally friendly fuel in place of diesel. While selecting the sources for extraction of biodiesel, the maximum focus is towards non-edible oils like Thumba, cotton, mahua oil etc., instead of edible oils like sunflower, palm, soybean oil etc., to reduce affecting food security. This review, therefore, displays various characteristics like performance and emission characteristics while using Thumba oil biodiesel in a diesel engine. Among highlights, this review covers properties of Thumba oil and Thumba oil treatment methods as well. In this review paper, researchers indicated that Thumba biodiesel reduces various pollutants like carbon monoxide (CO), hydrocarbon (HC), etc. related to diesel. It also covers that among all blends, preheated B20 Thumba biodiesel blend is having better emission and performance characteristics.
