Could Sustainable Fuel Derived from Cooking Oil Help Aviation Navigate to a Cleaner Future?

by Zhaki Abdullah (Channel News Asia) ... Sustainable aviation fuels (SAF) will play a major role in this new normal for aviation, said Jonathan Wood, Neste’s Europe and Asia-Pacific vice president for renewable aviation.

The term refers to biofuels that can be derived from a variety of sources, ranging from used cooking oil to agricultural waste.

“In its neat form and over the lifecycle it reduces greenhouse gas emissions by up to 80 per cent compared to fossil jet fuels,” said Mr Wood.

“The use of the fuel reduces local emissions and provides additional climate benefits through reduced particulate emissions,” he added.

One of the advantages of sustainable aviation fuel is that it can be used as a “drop-in fuel”, he noted - meaning it can be used with existing aircraft engines and infrastructure without any further modification.

Neste is currently expanding its Singapore facility to be able to produce up to one million tonnes of sustainable aviation fuel a year by 2023.

Neste is scaling up production of HEFA (Hydrotreated Esters and Fatty Acids) solutions, as well as investing in new technologies and feedstocks for the production of sustainable aviation fuel, he said, noting its focus in areas such as algae oils and municipal solid waste as sources.

Mr Wood notes that in the last year, Neste’s sustainable aviation fuel has been sold to seven airlines across different regions, including Lufthansa, American Airlines and ANA.

Other companies producing sustainable aviation fuel include Dutch firm SkyNRG and LanzaJet, an offshoot of biotech company LanzaTech.

One of the factors possibly discouraging greater take up of the fuel is cost, with it costing two to four more times the price of fossil fuels.

Stimulus investments could push its production to make up 2 per cent of all jet fuel used annually, which could make sustainable aviation fuel more price competitive against conventional jet fuel, said IATA.

Mr Lyle (Chris Lyle, the chief executive of consultancy Air Transport Economics) pointed to the potential of synthetic fuels made through the power-to-liquid (PtL) process, where renewable electricity and CO2 can be converted into liquid fuels, which can reduce carbon emissions to almost zero depending on the power source.

... the 80 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions generated by sustainable aviation fuels has been independently verified by organisations such as the International Civil Aviation Organization and the Roundtable on Sustainable Biomaterials. READ MORE