The target of using 10% biofuel in the form of Federal Aviation Administration-certified J50 blend fuel — 50% hydrocarbon kerosene and 50% Bio-SPK — will require 17.5 billion liters of biokerosene. This will need 45 million tonnes ofJatropha oil seed in production by 2017, covering a landmass of 10 million hectares. IATA’s other preferred biomass sources (algae and Camelina) will augment supplies, but not by enough. Clearly, then, if the aviation industry is to meet its own targets, production of bio-feed­stocks must be ramped up on a colossal scale.

Federal and EU regulators will continue to put financial pressure on carbon dioxide emissions. Industry bodies have set themselves ambitious targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions. Biofuels have proven themselves in performance as technically sound, drop-in fuels for aircraft. They reduce immensely the carbon output of flying by better fuel performance and much lower carbon dioxide emissions.

The European Union targets to raise the share of biofuels in transport to 10% by 2020 — this includes energy from biofuels, hydrogen, and green electricity. The airline industry would like to meet these targets already in 2017. Test flights with several kinds of biofuels like waste, animal fat, Camelina, and Jatropha have already proven that biofuels are a viable alternative to kerosene.

The European Union has made it clear that only biofuels that meet strict sus­tainability criteria qualify for true biofuels. Fuels that cause mass deforestation and food shortages do not fall into the biofuel category. The EU Renewable Energy Directive stipulates that biofuels must offer at least 35% carbon emission savings compared to fossil fuels. The figure rises to 50% as of 2017 and 60% as of 2018.

The problem is that truly “green” biofuels are not available in large quantities in mid-2012 and are not expected to hit the market on a sufficiently large commercial scale before 2015 at best.

The “food-or-fuel” and “indirect land change” discussions are intensive on a political level, and they have dissuaded the European Commission from making any forward-looking statements about the potential contribution of biofuels to the renewable energy targets of the European Union.

17

Biokerosene

17.1