Aircraft

DARPA expects quick results from BioFuels programme

By Graham Warwick

The first samples of jet fuel produced from agricultural oils will be available within weeks, says the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).

Two of the three teams working under DARPA's BioFuels programme are to deliver 100ml(3.4 fl oz) samples of JP-8 surrogate by August, followed by 100 litres to run in engines, says programme manager Douglas Kirkpatrick.

Two of the three teams working under DARPA's BioFuels programme are to deliver 100ml(3.4 fl oz) samples of JP-8 surrogate by August, says programme manager Douglas Kirkpatrick.

The goal of the 18-month programme is to pilot processes for "sustainably and affordably" converting agricultural oils to a jet fuel indistinguishable from JP-8 in all its characteristics, including energy density and cold flow.

Sustainable means the biofeedstock cannot compete with food market, says Kirkpatrick. This requires the process to be adaptable to different feeds depending on location and season, he says.

As an affordability goal DARPA has set a target cost (not price) of less than $3/USgal [80 cents/litre]. "We're not interested if it's over $5 a gallon."

BioFuels contracts have been awarded to the University of North Dakota's Energy & Environmental Research Center (EERC), Honeywell process technology company UOP and General Electric's GE Global Research. By the end of the programme, they are each to deliver 100 litre samples for engine testing plus a commercialisation plan.

UOP is focused on producing JP-8 from coconut and soy oil using "a classic refinery-based cracking process", says Kirkpatrick. EERC, in contrast, is pursuing a cheaper "no-crack" process that can use a variety of feedstocks in small-scale refineries that could be co-located with agricultural oil production plants close to the crops.

GE's "wild card", says Kirkpatrick, is camelina - an ancient seed crop that can grow on poor-quality land with minimal irrigation and human intervention.

GE also uses known refinery processes, but has an innovative way of producing hydrogen for hydrogenation, which removes oxygen from the biofuel to achieve the required energy density. "The fuel must be totally de-ogygenated," he says.

Kirkpatrick is confident the BioFuels programme will result in commercial processes that could meet half the US military's jet fuel needs from crop oils without competing with the food chain.

But longer-term, higher-risk research under way into converting algae or even cellulosic materials has the potential to meet all US fuel needs, he says.

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