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When will a diesel be available for my aircraft? |
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News, facts, and comments on the coming revolution for piston-engine aircraft.News of December 19, 2009DOE Moving On BioFuel, while Boeing and UOP work on green Jetfuel.The DOE intends to develop biofuels that can act as drop in replacements for diesel and gasoline and believes that domestic sources -- including both cellulosic ethanol and algae-based fuels -- can match almost 100 percent of the U.S. demand. Biomass Magazine has reported that the agency has solicited $50 million for algal biofuel development through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. The goal is to apply the monies to develop a consortium of research and development teams that will aggregate all the experts and apply their work to key targets. Currently, the DOE hopes to accelerate the development of hydrocarbon-based biofuels, targeting a pilot scale rollout at the end of five years. DOE hopes algae-based fuels could hope to be at the same stage within about ten years if funds are released to allow development of a consortia-based research program. Algae's potential productivity far outpaces that of land-based crop productivity (corn), but hurdles remain and the DOE has set deadlines. For algae to become a fuel source, algal cultivation and biology must be analyzed both economically and technologically. Proposals that detail plans for moving from research to development are sitting with the DOE, which plans to announce its decisions by year-end. (AVweb, 11/16/09) Meanwhile, UOP and Boeing work on a new class of Jet Fuel... Airlines are under serious pressure to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, so when the most prolific oil refinery technology provider on the planet teams up with the world’s biggest airplane manufacturer, they produce results—and a new class of fuel. More than a year and a half ago, a task force was put together to investigate alternative jet fuels. Its creation was initiated by the aviation industry to facilitate development of fuel alternatives so private airlines can meet upcoming regulations on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions; and so the military can gain supply security and cost stability. In September, ASTM International published a new fuel specification for aviation turbine fuels containing synthesized hydrocarbons, D7566. While D7566 was under development, news reports on aviation testing of a nebulous “biofuel” abounded, even if most of them lacked any real definition of what kind of biofuel this was exactly: bio-derived synthetic paraffinic kerosene (bio-SPK). In June 2007, UOP LLC won a defense department’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency award to develop and commercialize a process converting renewable feedstocks such as algae into a replacement for Jet Propellant 8 (JP-8) to be used by U.S. and North Atlantic Treaty Organization militaries. In November 2008, Air New Zealand, The Boeing Company, Rolls-Royce and Honeywell's UOP announced a collaboration to demonstrate a 50/50 blend of Jet A-1, the standard commercial aviation fuel, and jatropha-based green jet fuel. In January 2009, Continental Airlines held a demonstration flight using a similar fuel blend in a Boeing aircraft. Later that month, Japan Airlines announced a demo flight using camelina-based SPK. Six months later, 12 representatives of the companies mentioned above, plus executives from Virgin Atlantic Airways, engine maker Pratt & Whitney, GE-Aviation and others, signed a document titled “Evaluation of Bio-Derived Synthetic Paraffinic Kerosenes,” displaying acceptance of the research. A common theme throughout all of those reports was the involvement of UOP, the most prolific oil refinery technology provider on the planet, and Boeing, the world’s largest airplane manufacturer. According to Jennifer Holmgren, director of renewable energy and chemicals business unit for UOP, more than half of all the hydrocrackers in operation today are UOP-designed. Hydrocrackers are used by oil refiners to process crude petroleum into transportation fuels utilizing heat, pressure, catalysis and hydrogen. Boeing is the most recognized name in aircraft design and manufacturing. Terrance Scott, a member of Boeing’s environmental strategy team, says when it comes to improving aviation’s environmental footprint, many options available to ground transportation just aren’t feasible for aviation. “We can’t go with an electric plane,” he says. Airlines must, therefore, focus on making their planes more fuel efficient and embrace bio-derived synthetic jet fuels to meet future GHG reduction targets, which the EU has in place for 2012 in the form of a cap-and-trade scheme. “Any airplane flying into the EU must demonstrate its GHG reductions,” says Mark Rumizen, an aviation fuels specialist with the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration, and chairman of the ASTM synthetic aviation fuel task force. Scott says there are still ways to make airplanes more fuel-efficient, by making them lighter and faster, to fly farther on the same amount of fuel. “For every one pound of fuel saved, that’s 3.1 pounds of CO2 not being emitted,” he says. But Holmgren says making planes more fuel efficient is not enough to meet upcoming GHG reduction targets. “We must be looking at the fuel itself,” she says. According to Scott, however, aviation has a good track record overall—only 2 percent of all manmade CO2 emissions are generated by aviation. He tells Biodiesel Magazine that the aviation industry is targeting consumption of 600 MMgy of bio-SPK by 2015. UOP is finalizing commercialization of its process technology for production of bio-SPK, targeted for completion in fourth quarter 2009. The technology is based on UOP’s trademarked Ecofining process, a commercially available, licensable technology for green diesel production. While an Ecofining unit can produce up to 15 percent bio-SPK jet fuel as a coproduct of green diesel refining, the Renewable Jet process is designed to boost bio-SPK production to 70 percent by volume. “This is achieved by optimizing the catalytic processes of deoxygenation, isomerization and selective cracking of the hydrocarbons present in natural oils and fats,” the company states. In this line of work, catalysis is everything. Holmgren says UOP’s catalysts are proprietary, and small differences in yield output can make big impacts on a technology’s profitability. “There once was a time when we were not big into catalysis,” she says. “Now, 50 percent of our revenue comes from catalyst supply. See, processes don’t change that much, but catalysts continue to improve.” The UOP Renewable Jet process begins with standard oil cleanup procedures to remove impurities. Then, the oil is converted to shorter chain diesel-range paraffins by removing the oxygen and converting any olefins to paraffins by reacting them with hydrogen. Converting olefins to paraffins increases the thermal and oxidative stability of the fuel. A secondary catalytic reaction then takes place, which isomerizes and cracks the diesel-range paraffins (C14-C20) to shorter, highly branched molecules in the jet fuel range (C10-C14). The resulting fuel is virtually identical to jet fuel with one exception. “It doesn’t have any aromatics in it,” Rumizen says. “What those do is add density to the fuel, and help maintain proper functioning of the elastomeric seals,” also known as seal swell. This lack of aromatics in bio-SPK is why the new D7566 spec only covers up to a 50 percent blend. The petroleum-derived portion of the fuel provides enough aromatics for adequate seal swell. While Rumizen says the known differences between bio-SPK and conventional jet fuel are well understood, there are a couple of debates going on right now. “One is whether we can we approve a new class of fuel on just the analysis of the final fuel without controlling the process?” he poses. The aviation industry is very conservative when it comes to making changes because of the safety issues involved with flying passengers six miles high. “Do we need to worry about the process?” he asks. “Another area of question is will there be limitations on feedstocks? What about the concern of carry-through of trace materials—like with mercury in fish oil? How do we define process criteria?” Stay tuned… (BioDiesel Magazine 12/09) Andre’s Comment on both stories: One can imagine a BioFuel derived from Algae. But whether from Algae, palm oil, corn, fruits or any other biomass, concentration of constituents which have a caloric content and therefore can be used as fuel, means separation from the biomass constituted mainly with water. Just as it takes energy (distillation or membrane separation or catalytic cracking or other) to make brandy out of wine (wine is 85-90% water), it will also take energy here, and the cost will be high. The main message remains that future aviation fuels for piston engines will be costly, except Jetfuel. Jetfuel, needed for massive consumption for air transportation, will be in the future the lowest prices fuel; and yet its bio-content will make it somewhat costlier than regular Jetfuel. In any case, for piston engines, Diesel, here you come! posted at 11:33 AM |
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