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New Energy World
New Energy World embraces the whole energy industry as it connects and converges to address the decarbonisation challenge. It covers progress being made across the industry, from the dynamics under way to reduce emissions in oil and gas, through improvements to the efficiency of energy conversion and use, to cutting-edge initiatives in renewable and low carbon technologies.
China’s first helicopter flight using sustainable aviation fuel
28/6/2023
An Airbus H125 helicopter has completed what is claimed to be the first helicopter flight to use sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) in China. Meanwhile, plans have been announced to build the UK’s first SAF handling terminal.
Belonging to State Grid Space Technology (SGST), the helicopter flight demonstration took place at Hefei Shiwan Airport, using a hybrid ratio of 40% of SAF provided by China National Aviation Fuel (CNAF).
According to Du Guihe, SGST Chairman, the flight represents a ‘breakthrough for China’s general aviation industry to better implement carbon emission reduction’ and will ‘stimulate SAF promotion and its application’ in the future.
The milestone came just a few weeks after Airbus and CNAF signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to ‘intensify Chinese-European cooperation on the production, competitive application and common standards formulation for SAF’ during a French state visit to China. According to Airbus, the agreement will help ‘optimise the SAF supply chain by diversifying the sources and enhancing SAF production towards the ambition of using 10% SAF by 2030’.
SAF is an alternative aviation fuel made from feedstock ranging from used fat, oil and grease, to municipal and forestry waste, which, when compared to fossil jet fuel, has been shown to offer up to an 80% reduction in CO2 across the entire SAF lifecycle.
Airbus reports that all its helicopters are currently capable of flying with a blend of up to 50% of SAF mixed with kerosene. It aims to have all of them operating with 100% SAF by 2030.
UK’s first SAF handling terminal to be developed on Teesside
Meanwhile, UK independent bulk liquid storage provider Navigator Terminals has signed an infrastructure partnership with global renewables project developer, engineering and construction company Alfanar to develop what is claimed will be the UK’s first SAF handling terminal.
Navigator will build the North Tees rail terminal for the receipt, storage and handling of up to 1mn tonnes of non-recyclable waste feedstocks for Alfanar’s Lighthouse Green Fuels waste-to-SAF plant located in Port Clarence. It will also construct a SAF handling terminal on its North Tees dockside.
The Lighthouse Green Fuels project is expected to be operational in 2028, producing over 125,000 t/y of SAF, equivalent to 10% of the UK government’s Jet Zero 2030 SAF target.
In other news, Greenergy has unveiled plans to enter the SAF market through a new plant on Teesside. The company has submitted a planning application for two renewable fuel plants located at the same complex. One plant will be the UK’s first to create SAF from waste oils, according to Greenergy, while the other will convert end-of-life tyres into recovered carbon black and low-carbon road and marine transport fuels.
Both projects will be located adjacent to the company’s existing Teesside biofuel manufacturing facility. Subject to the successful planning approval process, construction will begin in 2025 and commercial production in 2027.
Bank of America to join one of the world’s largest SAF programmes
Elsewhere, B2B travel platform American Express Global Business Travel (Amex GBT) and Shell Aviation have announced that Bank of America is the first financial institution to join their SAF programme.
The programme launched in 2022 with 1mn gallons of SAF available for corporate customers – enough to power almost 15,000 business trips from London-to-New York. Operated on the Avelia platform, it is one of the world’s first blockchain-powered digital SAF book-and-claim solutions for business travel.
SAF is currently the aviation industry’s most promising pathway to decarbonise air travel; however, it currently makes up less than 0.1% of available aviation fuel and is two- to eight-times more expensive than conventional fossil-based jet fuel, according to the International Air Transport Association (IATA).
