The viability of aviation biofuels: new results from Australia

The work involved detailed techno-economic modelling of the processes to convert three feedstocks – sucrose from sugar cane; microalgae; and oily seeds from a tree called Pongamia – to produce a minimum selling price for aviation biofuel. The results showed that using current proven technologies, the biofuels would be economically competitive with crude oil at a price per barrel of $301 (sugarcane), $374 (Pongamia seeds) and $1,343 (microalgae).

IL BIOECONOMISTA

Ground-breaking Australian research on the viability of aviation biofuels was released last Friday, at the culmination of almost three years of work by The University of Queensland, James Cook University, The Boeing Company, Virgin Australia, Mackay Sugar and IOR Energy.

The results of the unique study as part of the Queensland Sustainable Aviation Fuel Initiative have been published in the international journal Biofuels, Bioproducts and Biorefining and were presented at the Boeing-hosted Aero Environment Summit in Sydney.

Researchers at the Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, based at The University of Queensland, looked at the engineering and associated financial viability of biofuel production.

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N.S.W in the forefront for algae fuel

Aquatic Biofuels

Renewable Energy technologies nearly always focus on new ways to develop electrical power. If you stop and think about it, wind, solar, wave, tidal, hydro and so on all produce electricity, and although of extreme relevance and importance to mitigate the effects of global warming and reduce greenhouse gases very little is being done to reduce emissions from the transport sector.

The only alternatives are electric transport (still utilizing electricity which is being produced from fossil fuels), hydrogen (not yet a viable and safe alternative) and ethanol fuel, which in some parts of the world has proven to be successful, however, it would mean a major change in engines and it would bring disadvantages to the sugar industry.

Fossil fuels are still therefore, a major part of our lives when it comes to transport; be it cars, buses, boats, planes or scooters and the Greenhouse Gas Emissions (GHG) that…

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