While we wait for Gevo to turn our corn and multi-million-dollar tax breaks into jet fuel, Virgin Atlantic is ready to feed its planes vegetabular material that has already helped feed people:
…Rolls-Royce Trent 1000 engines will power the airline’s flagship Boeing 787s as they fly from London Heathrow to New York.
However, this will not be a typical commercial airline flight; rather, it will be the first passenger flight in the history of commercial aviation that uses only sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).
This flight is anticipated to be powered by SAF, which is mostly made from used cooking oil and other waste oils and fats.
Compared to conventional fossil jet fuel, SAF can reduce lifecycle carbon emissions by nearly 70% when entirely replacing aviation kerosene.
The usage of 100% SAF along with carbon removal using credits for biochar, a substance that captures and stores carbon removed from the atmosphere, will result in a net-zero flight [Baba Tamim, “World’s First Net-Zero Transatlantic Flight: Fly London to New York on Used Cooking Oil,” Interesting Engineering, 2022.12.17].
The Royal Air Force flew one of its Voyager tanker/transport planes on 100% cooking oil in November. The Dallas-Fort Worth airport has been converting used cooking oil from its McDonald’s shops into jet fuel. Fly the friendly fries….
Consider the bang for the bushel here: we can use an acre of land to grow crops to be turned directly into jet fuel, or we can use the same acre to grow crops to be turned first into edibles, or at least cookables to help make edibles, and then squeeze jet fuel out of the leftovers.
That’s a pretty neato story the media wrote. grudznick knows firsthand about this sort of thing, and our old friend Mr. Lansing (MHRIP) used to short-order cook up a slew of this sort of juice that could fuel our futures.
I heard Mr. Lansing now lives in Paris and is wintering in Cannes.
Indeed.
He seems to have already made the news. Blue link provided.
https://freecraic.com/yank-producer-runs-amok-in-cannes/
Wasn’t there a guy who used to travel the country this way? Did he cook his goose?
Unbridled, uninformed enthusiasm needs always be checked by fact:
“In 2019, 13 million gallons (50 million litres) of SAFs were used in flights, just 0.01% of global aviation fuel, meaning the industry missed a goal set in 2010 to reach 6% use by 2020. Several EU countries have already set blending mandates for SAFs: the Netherlands, for example, has said 14% of its aviation fuel must be sustainable by 2030.
The reason so little is currently used is that these fuels are both expensive and have very limited supply. The vast majority of sustainable fuels used in aviation today come from advanced waste biofuels, but there is demand for this from other sources such as cars, trucks and ships. And as countries aim to establish more sustainable economies, making biofuels in this way could become more difficult.
“There are competing uses for it and not a lot of availability, because who knows, in 2030, how much waste we will actually produce,” says Jo Dardenne, manager of aviation at the Brussels-based non-profit Transport and Environment (T&E). “We’re moving towards a more circular economy.”
T&E has warned against setting targets for clean aviation fuels too high, due to concerns over a lack of sustainable options in the short term. They warn that pushing the aviation industry to use more biofuels before reliable sources are in place could lead airlines to switch to low quality, unsustainable food-based biofuels – such as those made from palm oil and linked to deforestation.”
https://theicct.org/publication/estimating-sustainable-aviation-fuel-feedstock-availability-to-meet-growing-european-union-demand/
Mr. DaveFN has more take here than Mr. H even provided in his original blogging. Good take, Mr. DaveFN.
No benefit in clogging Gen Z arteries with fried food. Once beef becomes cultured and the pastures are rewilded, there will be lots of biofuels available. Until then there are approximately 3.4 million acres of dead ponderosa-lodgepole pines ready for biofuel processing.
Bonnie Raitt and Willie Nelson use biofueled tour buses.
DaveFN, are you opposed to all forms of alternative energy?
To what extent is supply limited just because we haven’t been making much effort in that direction? How much waste oil is available for conversion?
Nearly carbon-free driving with an internal combustion engine is possible but takes work. Porsche has been investigating synthetic eFuels for many years and turned on a new plant in Chile today to start making fuel from water and carbon dioxide.
– Chile is an ideal location for this facility because it has plenty of renewable energy sources, Porsche said, and the end product can easily be shipped from there around the world.
– The first batches of eFuel will be used for promotional “lighthouse projects,” but Porsche hopes to be selling 145 million gallons of this new eFuel on the open market each year before the end of the decade.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/autos/news/porsche-fires-up-production-of-efuel-made-from-water-in-chile/ar-AA15uw4A?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=b700453d700b4d8ca7068aaafa42cd90