At the Paris Air Show Boeing and a series of partners involved in four biofuels-based test flights released the data from the tests, and said that with the release they are on a path towards flight certification of biofuels as soon as late 2010.

Billy Glover, managing director of Environmental Strategy for Boeing Commercial Airplanes, said that the group, which includes UOP Honeywell and the US Air Force Research Lab, is preparing a submission to ASTM that will qualify what the group is now calling Bio-SPK fuel.

Jennifer Holmgren, general manager for biofuels at UOP, confirmed that UOP expects to commence licensing its fuel technology at the end of this summer, and said that it has already commenced advanced discussions with multiple potential licensees.

A CFM 56-7 jet engine, similar to the engine used in the Continental biofuels test flight

In the long term, Glover said that biofuels could replace as much as 40 percent of the 70 billion gallons of jet fuel consumd by the commercial aviation industry per year. But Glover and Holmgren cautioned that organizing the supply chain, beginning with feedstocks, was critical to developing a sustainable alternative to fossil fuels.

Virgin Atlantic, Continental, Japan Air Lines and Air New Zealand and the group as a whole conducted a series of laboratory, ground and flight tests conducted between 2006 and 2009 indicated the test fuels performed as well as or better than typical petroleum-based Jet A. The tests revealed that using the Bio-SPK fuel blends had no adverse effects on the engines or their components. They also showed that the fuels have an average 1.8 percent greater energy content by mass than typical petroleum-derived jet fuel.

The report was signed by Boeing, fuel technology developer UOP; engine-makers GE Aviation, CFM International, Pratt & Whitney, Rolls-Royce and Honeywell and airlines Air New Zealand (ANZ), Continental Airlines (CAL), Japan Airlines (JAL) and Virgin Atlantic. Test flights involved an ANZ 747-400 powered by Rolls-Royce engines, a CAL 737-800 powered by CFM engines and a JAL 747-300 powered by Pratt & Whitney engines. In addition, GE conducted static testing at its Ohio facility. Virgin Atlantic proved the technical viability of biofuels at high altitude with its test flight in early 2008.

The first flight, by Virgin Atlantic in February 2008, was described by the group as a “proof of concept,” and test results were reported from the three subsequent test flights by Air New Zealand, Japan Air Lines and Continental. Jatropha, algae and camelina oils were used in different combinations, and Beoing and UOP confirmed that halophytes such as salicornia, while not flight tested, are also showing promise.

Continental Boeing 737 on the tarmac at George Bush International prior to takeoff on a biofuels test flight

Other feedstocks will be considered in the future and the group said they expect aviation biofuels to include a wider range than have been tested so far. “Three years ago when we started this process,” said Holmgren, “I don’t think any one of us had ever heard of jatropha or camelina.”

“To be honest, it’s been hard to follow up on all the new feedstock opportunities,” added Glover. “After we complete this part of the process, we’ll start to look closely at more. I’m confident there are many other possibilities out there.”

The group said that their goals in the test were adding to the overall fuel supply, giving airlines opportunities to respond to price volatility for fossil fuels, and to fundamentally reduce the CO2 emissions footprint of commercial aviation.

Glover said that jatropha and camelina represented the strongest near-term options; algae was described as technically acceptable, but “not quite ready for prime time” in terms of developing a means of delivering large quantities of algae-based fuels on a commercial scale at the present time.

The group confirmed that, in addition to the lifecycle analysis that had been completed for camelina, analysis on jatropha is expected from a team at Yale by the end of the year, and a team led by the NRDC is expected to complete analysis of algae fuels as soon as next year.

UOP said that it was modeling future refineries for renewable jet fuel using a 60-150 Mgy scale, and said that while this was only a fraction of the typical 4.2 billion gallon per year scale of a typical oil refinery that the size was the most effective given the expected supply chain for renewable jet fuel feedstocks. Holmgren said that it was possible to greenfield the proposed refineries or, better, construct them adjacent to existing chemical plant,s pulp and paper, or existing refineries to utilize similar support infrastructure. UOP said that it expects the cost of refineries to be in the $150 million range.

Boeing also said that there was emerging interest at the Air Force and Navy in renewable jet fuels, and said that it expected an approval process to eventually commence with aircraft such as the C-17 Globemaster transporter.

Glover said that he expects that smaller companies would be the first ones to construct refineries for renewable jet fuel, but Jennifer Holmgren confirmed that “oil companies are watching carefully” and “have some interest although I wouldn’t say they are bullish”. Both confirmed that interest in aviation biofuels is not limited regionally.

A copy of the report on Bio-SPK aviation biofuels is here, including a summary of fuel performance and emissions data.

The most recent Biofuels Digest Special Report on Aviation Biofuels is here.

Recently, Air New Zealand ran a test flight of a jet plane fueled with a biofuel blend made with jatropha. The results showed a fuel savings of 1.2%, amounting to more than a ton of fuel over the course of a 12-hour flight. The CO2 emissions from the airplane were reduced by an even more impressive amount -- in excess of 60%. The flight is one that offers some evidence that perhaps it is feasible for airlines to adopt biofuels in order to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases.

Jatropha can provide a biofuel that may help improve jet performance while reducing CO2 emissions.
Image credit: Frank Vincentz via Wikimedia Commons

Jatropha has been recognized recently as a viable alternative to many biofuels. Gas 2.0 reports on the reasons that jatropha seems to show such promise:

"A second generation biofuel, jatropha is grown on land that doesn't compete with food. It requires almost no care and very little water. Another major benefit of jatropha is that, due to its ability to take hold in harsh wastelands, it can be used to help stop erosion in these areas and reclaim them for agricultural production."

Air New Zealand worked with Rolls-Royce, Boeing and Honeywell's UOP to develop drop-in biofuel technology, which involves a commercial Boeing 747 carrying a Rolls Royce engine. The fuel used is a blend of standard jet fuel and kerosene derived from jatropha oil.

Of course, the main concern is cost. With oil prices so low right now, jet fuel is relatively inexpensive. The cost-efficiency of the process of producing the biofuel is not as competitive as it could be. However, if oil prices rise again in the future, such biofuels may become more desirable from a cost standpoint -- as they already are from an environmental standpoint.

Jet fuels derived from algae, camelina and jatropha--plants that pack an energy punch, are not eaten as food and do not displace food crops--could be approved and replacing petroleum fuels in commercial flights as eraly as next year, a Boeing executive said yesterday.

Bill Glover, managing director of environmental strategy for Boeing Commercial Airplanes, which is leading an effort to develop, test and certify alternative jet fuels, said the technology is ready. Now, it is just a matter of growing enough non-food feedstock plants and refining enough of their oil.

In the past year and a half, commercial airlines have flown four successful test flights using a variety of biofuel-jet fuel blends. Boeing was involved in all four flights, including a Virgin Atlantic flight using a coconut- and babassu-derived biofuel blend; an Air New Zealand flight using a jatropha-derived biofuel blend; a Continental Airlines flight using a blend of algae- and jatropha-derived biofuel; and a Japan Airlines flight using an algae-, jatropha- and camelina-derived biofuel blend.

"We've proven the technical capability of biofuel as a drop-in replacement," Glover said. "It meets all jet fuel requirements and then some."

Not only has the industry proved the technical capability, but it also has shown that biofuels can improve overall fuel efficiency.

Air New Zealand said yesterday that using a 50 percent blend of biofuel with traditional jet A-1 fuel can improve fuel efficiency by more than 1 percent, according to data collected during the December 2008 test flight. On a 12-hour flight, that would save 1.43 metric tons of fuel and reduce carbon dioxide emissions by about 4.5 metric tons, the airline said.

Information like that likely will help the industry get second-generation biofuels certified as drop-in replacements for jet fuel.

"Certainly the data from our biofuel test flight will be a critical component towards helping biofuel become a certified aviation fuel," Air New Zealand's general manager of airline operations and chief pilot, Capt. David Morgan, said in a statement.

Next month, a coalition headed by Boeing will release a full report on all the test flights. And after that, the international standards board that approves fuels and chemicals could certify plant-derived biofuels as jet A-1 fuel within a year, Glover said.

Once the fuels are approved as jet A-1, they can immediately be used as drop-in replacements. "Airplanes are already certified to operate on anything known as jet A-1," Glover added.

Glover and other executives said they think the approval process will be smooth because after processing plant oils, "We leave a hydrocarbon that looks exactly like petroleum fuel," said Jennifer Holmgren, the general manager of renewable energy and chemicals at UOP, the company that derived the plant-oil refining and processing treatment for the Air New Zealand, Continental and Japan Airlines test flights.

And the certification does not have to be feedstock-dependent, Holmgren said, because UOP's process can produce the same end product from all the feedstocks.

"The report will not be feedstock-specific," Glover said. "It will be generic to whoever can meet the performance requirements."

Which feedstock is best?

Some feedstocks show more promise than others--at least in the short term.

Tom Todaro, CEO of Targeted Growth, a molecular biology firm that tweaks camelina and algae genes to create productive feedstocks, said algae is eight to 10 years away from production, whereas camelina is ready now.

Boeing's Glover, who also serves as co-chairman of the Algal Biomass Organization, agreed that algae-derived fuels are in their early stages.

"Camelina is the blue-collar version of canola," Todaro said. "It's the mean older brother. It's not food-ready; it tastes funny. But it works well as oil."

Todaro's firm is growing camelina on fallow fields in Montana, the Dakotas, Idaho, Washington and the High Plains of Texas. But he said the United States has the potential to produce about 1 billion gallons of camelina oil a year in areas as diverse as Georgia and New Mexico.

That amount is only a drop in the bucket compared with the 65 billion gallons of fuel the aviation industry uses worldwide each year, but it is a start, the executives said.

And it shows that the industry is starting to scale up. Last month, Sapphire Energy, an algae biofuel company that participated in the Continental test flight, said it would be producing 1 million gallons of diesel and jet fuel a year by 2011 (Greenwire, April 28).

Any aviation-biofuel solution is going to involve a wide variety of feedstocks, the executives said.

"Each [feedstock] will probably make an important contribution," UOP's Holmgren said.

Glover agreed. "We want variety. Creativity is really a good thing," he said. "We need a portfolio of things."