NEW research shows a pathway toward full decarbonisation of US aviation fuel use by biofuels produced from poor quality grasslands, reports Maryland's ScienceDaily.
This, the Arizona State University-led six-person research team found that planting globally growing miscanthus grass on 23.2 million hectares of existing marginal lands across the US would meet biofuel needs.
The study, funded by the National Science Foundation as part of the Water Sustainability and Climate initiative, claimed would provide enough biomass feedstock to meet the liquid fuel demands of the US aviation fully from biofuels, an amount expected to reach 30 billion gallons a year by 2040.
'If we are serious about getting to net zero greenhouse gas emissions, we need to deal with emissions from air travel which are expected to grow under a business-as-usual scenario. Finding alternative, more sustainable liquid fuel sources for aviation is key to this,' said team member Nazli Uludere Aragon.
Said leading team member Nathan Parker, an assistant professor in the School of Sustainability: 'The current way we produce sustainable jet fuel is very land inefficient and not on a large scale. There are very limited ways that aviation could become low carbon emitting with a correspondingly low climate impact and this is one way we've shown that is feasible and can get the aviation industry to be carbon neutral through agriculture.'
Researchers found miscanthus to be the more promising feedstock, and biojet fuels derived from miscanthus can meet the 30 billion gallons/year target at an average cost of US$4.10/gallon against $2/gallon price for conventional fuel.
SeaNews Turkey
This, the Arizona State University-led six-person research team found that planting globally growing miscanthus grass on 23.2 million hectares of existing marginal lands across the US would meet biofuel needs.
The study, funded by the National Science Foundation as part of the Water Sustainability and Climate initiative, claimed would provide enough biomass feedstock to meet the liquid fuel demands of the US aviation fully from biofuels, an amount expected to reach 30 billion gallons a year by 2040.
'If we are serious about getting to net zero greenhouse gas emissions, we need to deal with emissions from air travel which are expected to grow under a business-as-usual scenario. Finding alternative, more sustainable liquid fuel sources for aviation is key to this,' said team member Nazli Uludere Aragon.
Said leading team member Nathan Parker, an assistant professor in the School of Sustainability: 'The current way we produce sustainable jet fuel is very land inefficient and not on a large scale. There are very limited ways that aviation could become low carbon emitting with a correspondingly low climate impact and this is one way we've shown that is feasible and can get the aviation industry to be carbon neutral through agriculture.'
Researchers found miscanthus to be the more promising feedstock, and biojet fuels derived from miscanthus can meet the 30 billion gallons/year target at an average cost of US$4.10/gallon against $2/gallon price for conventional fuel.
SeaNews Turkey