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Post by Dave Homewood on Oct 1, 2018 17:00:32 GMT 12
Around ten years ago Air New Zealand was one of the leading airlines in researching the use of biofuel in their jets. It was big news at the time but since then i have heard nothing.
I was wondering, how did it work out? Are their aeroplanes regularly flown today powered with biofuel? What percentage are they running at against normal petroleum based jet fuel? And is it actually saving any money?
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Post by AussieBob on Oct 1, 2018 18:37:45 GMT 12
In the NZ Herald 4 June 2008
Air New Zealand expects 10 per cent of its fuel - enough to run the entire domestic fleet - to come from a nut grown in India and Africa within five years.
The national carrier has announced it will use oil from jatropha nuts to fuel a test flight this year - the first of its kind using a sustainable biofuel with commercial potential. By 2013 it says the fuel will provide it with one million barrels a year.
Group strategy manager Abhy Maharaj said jatropha met all the airline's "non-negotiable" criteria.
It was cheaper than traditional jet fuel, emitted less carbon dioxide and was socially responsible - it was grown on land unsuitable for food crops, which had not been forest land for at least 20 years.
Air New Zealand has spent $1 million in a year on its biofuels project. Mr Maharaj said when it started oil was about $80 a barrel.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Oct 1, 2018 19:42:34 GMT 12
Yep, and ten years down the track, where does it all sit? That is what I was asking.
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Post by scrooge on Oct 1, 2018 19:58:54 GMT 12
It doesn't, to my knowledge no-one is using bio-fuel, oil dropped in price so it wasn't developed.
Second thought was that there was also a problem with obtaining sufficient supply (quantity, quality and over a reasonable period of time)- i.e. an actual, commercially sized, refinery.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Oct 1, 2018 21:36:10 GMT 12
Oh right. Thanks Andrew. Interesting, and I guess that explains why we don't hear much about it now.
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Post by AussieBob on Oct 3, 2018 8:18:32 GMT 12
Did they find that the revised engine tune/setup to suit bio-fuel did not satisfy the engine tune requirements when using conventional fuel. This then restricted the aircraft to the use of bio-fuel mix only which is not available world-wide and unsuitable for use of conventional fuel.
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Post by madmac on Oct 3, 2018 8:57:55 GMT 12
Or the price of Jet A1 came down a lot, and no one wanted to carry the cost of the Bio Fuels.
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