Paradoxically, an airline from the oil-rich Middle East is one of the first movers in the biokerosene race — Qatar Airways ("Your Five-Star Airline”). Qatar is the world’s number one gas producer and its refineries can produce biokerosene from domestic gas. This procedure is called gas-to-liquid (GTL). Qatar Airways has already made a test flight on 12 October 2009 using GTL kerosene from London Gatwick to Doha with passengers and the CEO on board. Now, Qatar Airways is developing biokerosene from biomass and plants, called biomass-to-liquid (BTL). In 2014, Qatar Airways hopes to fly with a 100% synthetic jet fuel as a mix of 50% GTL and 50% BTL, and give birth to the first zero-emission aircraft or zero-carbon aircraft in commercial air traffic! That would be a true sensation and I wish them luck in their efforts to realize their dreams.

In Doha, Qatar Airways, Qatar Science & Technology Park, Qatar Petroleum, and Airbus announced the establishment of the Qatar Advanced Biofuel Platform (QABP), which will prepare a detailed engineering and implementation plan for economically viable and sustainable biofuel production, a biofuel investment strategy, and an advanced technology development program ("Qatar Airways sets up platform to research and develop alternative jet fuel;” www. energyboom. com).

For BTL, the group has been advised by Seattle-based Verno Systems Inc. (www .vernosystems. com), and has embarked on a very comprehensive and detailed feasibility study on sustainable BTL jet fuel. QABP is structured so that it can be expanded to include additional projects, technologies, investments, and partner­ships globally, and is focused on short-, medium-, and long-term goals.

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