Airlines step up search for viable biofuels

By Bettina Wassener
Published: December 30, 2008

HONG KONG: Despite plunging oil prices, airlines are intensifying their search for alternative fuels to make flying more affordable and environmentally friendly for the long haul.
An early test of the commercial and technical viability of one such biofuel took place Tuesday in the skies above Auckland. Air New Zealand, the main New Zealand carrier, staged a successful test flight using oil derived from jatropha, a weed that can grow in arid conditions and produces inedible oil. That means it need not encroach on land or crops used for feeding the world's swelling population.
For two hours, pilots tested the oil, in a 50-50 blend with conventional jet fuel in one of the four Rolls-Royce engines powering a Boeing 747-400 aircraft - the first test flight by a commercial airline using jatropha oil.
"Today we stand at the earliest stages of sustainable fuel development and an important moment in aviation history," said Rob Fyfe, Air New Zealand's chief executive. The project has been 18 months in the works.
The results of the test flight - and two others by rival airlines in the United States and Japan in January - will be closely watched by an industry that is determined to wean itself from ultimately finite supplies of conventional crude oil and shift toward sources of renewable, low-emission fuels.

A big increase in crude oil prices - to more than $147 a barrel in July - provided a strong incentive for the industry to reduce its exposure to volatile oil prices as soon as possible.
But pressure to reduce carbon emissions also drove the search for alternatives. The International Air Transport Association, which represents 230 airlines, aims for its members to use 10 percent alternative fuels by 2017. The group also has the ambitious goal that airlines will be able to fly carbon-free 50 years from now, with the help of technologies like fuel cells and solar energy.
Such goals have ensured that research and development into greener flying have continued, despite the recent retreat in oil prices to $40 a barrel and despite shrinking demand as the global economy slows to a crawl.
Having conducted a series of tests Tuesday, Air New Zealand and its partners in the venture, the U.S. aircraft manufacturer Boeing, the British engine maker Rolls-Royce and the technology developer UOP, a part of the U.S. business Honeywell, will review the results "as part of our drive to have jatropha certified as an aviation fuel," said Captain David Morgan, the flight's chief pilot.
The hope is that the test results will lay the groundwork for jatropha to be available in commercially viable quantities in three to five years, executives of the companies said.
Virgin Atlantic in February became the first airline to test a commercial aircraft on a biofuel blend, using a 20 percent mixture of coconut oil and babassu oils in one of its four engines.
Two more airlines are to test their concoctions in quick succession next month. Continental Airlines on Jan. 7 will conduct a test flight powered by a blend involving algae and jatropha, the first biofuel flight by a commercial carrier using algae as a fuel source - and the first biofuel-powered demonstration flight of a U.S. commercial airliner.
And Japan Airlines is planning a test flight Jan. 30 from Tokyo using a fuel based on the camelina oilseed.
Together, the tests will try out not only different sources of alternative fuel, but also their use in an array of different engine types used by the world's airlines.
With the use of ethanol facing increasing criticism - it has been blamed for corn shortages that have led to food riots in parts of the world - hopes increasingly rest on inedible crops, like algae and jatropha, which can be grown without drawing on forested or arable land.
Unlike biofuels made from crops like soybeans and corn, jatropha needs little water or fertilizer and can be grown almost anywhere - even in sandy, saline or otherwise infertile soil. Each seed produces 30 percent to 40 percent of its mass in oil, meaning it has higher yield per acre than many other plant oils, experts say.
Still, even the potential use of jatropha has not been free of criticism, with some observers fearing that farmers could be tempted to substitute edible crops for jatropha in the hope of getting better prices.
Algae may be free of this potential problem, but research into algae is not as far advanced, said an Air New Zealand spokesman, Mark Street, explaining the airline's decision to focus on jatropha.
Air New Zealand, which aims to meet 10 percent of its fuel needs through sustainable biofuel by 2013, said the jatropha used on Tuesday's flight had been grown in Malawi, Mozambique and Tanzania.