British Airways made a significant commitment to bio jet fuel Monday, agreeing to use the entire output of Europe’s first bio jet fuel plant.
The airlines said it struck a deal with Solena Group to build a plant east of London that will convert bio-waste otherwise headed for landfill into fuel. The facility is expected to begin production in 2014.
Production to be relatively modest, but will cover flights at London City Airport
British Airways isn’t the first European or international carrier to agree to take steps to fight global warming. In December, 14 major airlines in Europe, the U.S. and elsewhere said they were negotiating with AltAir Fuels to buy up to 750 million gallons of bio jet fuel over 10 years. AltAir will build a production facility in Seattle to convert the plant camelina into fuel.
However British Airways decided to go its own way. Instead of cultivating a plant such as camilina (several others such as jatropa are promising) it is converting 500,000 tonnes of bio-waste into 16 million gallons of jet fuel equivalent. The bio-waste, vegetable residue and the like, will be gasified into BioSynGas and then converted to fuel.
No environmentally damaging leftovers remain from the process, says Arcadis, an advisor the project. Financial terms of the deal were not released.
While the output of the Solena plant is relatively modest, it will help reduce carbon output. British Airways estimates the fuel will power the company’s flights in and out of London City Airport. However, this amounts to just 2 percent of British Airway’s operations at of Heathrow, the world’s busiest airport.
The airline hopes to obtain 10 percent of its fuel from waste-to-energy operations by 2050.
While the Solena deal is a significant step in the right direction, it illustrates the magnitude of the problem. The airline’s intentions are good, but 10 percent 40 years isn’t enough to turn back the wave of worldwide atmospheric warming.
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