First transatlantic flight with sustainable fuel. Is this the future of flying? (Patreon)

 [This is a transcript.]

Last week, Virgin Atlantic chartered the world’s first-ever transatlantic flight powered by sustainable aviation fuel. Their Boeing 787 flight from London to New York was powered by a mix of waste oil and biofuel and intended to test the performance.

Sustainable Aviation Fuels, SAF for short, are a catch-all phrase for several different types of fuels. What they have in common is that they chemically resemble kerosene but that they cause much lower carbon dioxide emission as the usual stuff that’s derived from fossil fuels. Sustainable fuels include synthetic fuels that can be created from renewable energy. They also include biofuels that are created from plants. These plants take carbon dioxide out of the air when they grow, so when you burn the stuff that doesn’t increase the amount of carbon in the atmosphere. And since airplane engines aren’t known to be picky eaters, you can feed them with used oil, for example the stuff that your French fries have bathed in .

Airlines and the Biden administration are pushing SAFs as the most feasible way to decarbonize aviation, but the idea has some problems. First and most importantly, there isn’t remotely enough of it. Last year, the U.S. produced just about 16 million gallons of it, which is less than 0 point 1 percent of the consumption by US airlines.

Then there is the land use. One of Virgin’s main SAF suppliers is the American company Virent. Their biofuel is made from corn sugars, wood and agricultural waste, but growing this stuff competes with land use for food supply.  

Since there’s only so much waste oil and the land use of biofuels is high, to me synthetic kerosene seems the most viable option. It has the added benefit that since it’s chemically extremely pure it basically doesn’t create contrails which some climate scientists think contribute to global warming. Again, though the issue is that there isn’t remotely enough of it. Synthetic fuel production from renewables, sometimes called “power to liquid” is a great idea in principle, but in practice it so far only exists in small trials.

Either way, the US seems dead set on investing in the technology, with the Biden administration calling for SAF production to hit 3 billion gallons by 2030.

Though I really think they’re missing a major marketing scheme. Save the world by eating more fries!