First "Eco" Flight Today
Discussion
VS100 is flying from Heathrow to JFK at 11:30am and running on special petrol.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-67548961
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-67548961
Master Bean said:
VS100 is flying from Heathrow to JFK at 11:30am and running on special petrol.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-67548961
Jetfuel is more like diesel than petrol, so maybe special diesel is more accurate!https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-67548961
There's quite a bit being spent on SAF at present suspect a lot of the money is going to go to waste.
These are interesting developments - but definitely not petrol, that’s for ICE engines.
SAF may be the way forward, but the difficulty is producing SAF in sufficient quantities, and even that is likely to have environmental downsides - inc growing fuel not food.
At the moment SAF still has to be blended with JetA (kerosene). So, with critic’s questioning the use of excessive air travel - particularly by the rich and famous in their private jets - politicians, celebrities, sports personalities (esp F1), they will inevitably try and defend themselves by claiming to be “using bio fuels”.
But the actual blend percentage is likely to be very small.
SAF may be the way forward, but the difficulty is producing SAF in sufficient quantities, and even that is likely to have environmental downsides - inc growing fuel not food.
At the moment SAF still has to be blended with JetA (kerosene). So, with critic’s questioning the use of excessive air travel - particularly by the rich and famous in their private jets - politicians, celebrities, sports personalities (esp F1), they will inevitably try and defend themselves by claiming to be “using bio fuels”.
But the actual blend percentage is likely to be very small.
The RAF have been world leaders in the use of SAF for large "passenger" aircraft, using their Aibus A330 derived Voyager tanker/cargo/passenger aircraft on the first trial back a year ago so it's good to see a transatlantic flight happening now!
https://www.raf.mod.uk/news/articles/royal-air-for...
https://www.raf.mod.uk/news/articles/royal-air-for...
As expected, the 'activists' are still unhappy. But they always will be.
When you see an article like this https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-657... you realise the world is going up its own bottom.
When you see an article like this https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-657... you realise the world is going up its own bottom.
swampy442 said:
As an engine maintenance guy, my first thought is - Will there be a maintenance penalty for long term use of this? Will it coke up burners? Will you have to replace the fuel pumps after 200 hours etc?
As I work in the aviation fuel industry, no you won’t. SAF has to comply to standard aviation fuel specifications. It behaves exactly like standard aviation fuel in both burn characteristics and physical properties. It’s just how it’s made that is the big difference.Yes SAF officially has to be made up of a percentage of standard aviation fuel and SAF version, called “drop-in” but eventually it will be 100%. I did laugh when I heard the Virgin advertising on the radio yesterday this was happening as this is nothing really new, 100% has been done before.
Biggest problem with SAF is it’s expensive at moment so until it comes down it will either be used in small quantities or it’s costs will be passed on to…..guess who!
Also from a more technical point of view, traceability of aviation fuel is very important and when the supply chain has SAF included, those sources need to be tightly controlled.
We are a long long way off every flight to Tenerife using 100% SAF.
4.7AMV8 said:
As I work in the aviation fuel industry, no you won’t. SAF has to comply to standard aviation fuel specifications. It behaves exactly like standard aviation fuel in both burn characteristics and physical properties. It’s just how it’s made that is the big difference.
Yes SAF officially has to be made up of a percentage of standard aviation fuel and SAF version, called “drop-in” but eventually it will be 100%. I did laugh when I heard the Virgin advertising on the radio yesterday this was happening as this is nothing really new, 100% has been done before.
Biggest problem with SAF is it’s expensive at moment so until it comes down it will either be used in small quantities or it’s costs will be passed on to…..guess who!
Also from a more technical point of view, traceability of aviation fuel is very important and when the supply chain has SAF included, those sources need to be tightly controlled.
We are a long long way off every flight to Tenerife using 100% SAF.
What part of it has been done before out of interest? They are not claiming its the first "100% SAF ever" they are claiming first "100% SAF transatlantic flight". Yes SAF officially has to be made up of a percentage of standard aviation fuel and SAF version, called “drop-in” but eventually it will be 100%. I did laugh when I heard the Virgin advertising on the radio yesterday this was happening as this is nothing really new, 100% has been done before.
Biggest problem with SAF is it’s expensive at moment so until it comes down it will either be used in small quantities or it’s costs will be passed on to…..guess who!
Also from a more technical point of view, traceability of aviation fuel is very important and when the supply chain has SAF included, those sources need to be tightly controlled.
We are a long long way off every flight to Tenerife using 100% SAF.
At the moment there is a limit of 50% max SAF in fuel and this flight had to have special permissions to do this test, The only other thing I have read about is a 100% SAF test in a RAF Voyager that lasted 90mins.
Buzz84 said:
4.7AMV8 said:
As I work in the aviation fuel industry, no you won’t. SAF has to comply to standard aviation fuel specifications. It behaves exactly like standard aviation fuel in both burn characteristics and physical properties. It’s just how it’s made that is the big difference.
Yes SAF officially has to be made up of a percentage of standard aviation fuel and SAF version, called “drop-in” but eventually it will be 100%. I did laugh when I heard the Virgin advertising on the radio yesterday this was happening as this is nothing really new, 100% has been done before.
Biggest problem with SAF is it’s expensive at moment so until it comes down it will either be used in small quantities or it’s costs will be passed on to…..guess who!
Also from a more technical point of view, traceability of aviation fuel is very important and when the supply chain has SAF included, those sources need to be tightly controlled.
We are a long long way off every flight to Tenerife using 100% SAF.
What part of it has been done before out of interest? They are not claiming its the first "100% SAF ever" they are claiming first "100% SAF transatlantic flight". Yes SAF officially has to be made up of a percentage of standard aviation fuel and SAF version, called “drop-in” but eventually it will be 100%. I did laugh when I heard the Virgin advertising on the radio yesterday this was happening as this is nothing really new, 100% has been done before.
Biggest problem with SAF is it’s expensive at moment so until it comes down it will either be used in small quantities or it’s costs will be passed on to…..guess who!
Also from a more technical point of view, traceability of aviation fuel is very important and when the supply chain has SAF included, those sources need to be tightly controlled.
We are a long long way off every flight to Tenerife using 100% SAF.
At the moment there is a limit of 50% max SAF in fuel and this flight had to have special permissions to do this test, The only other thing I have read about is a 100% SAF test in a RAF Voyager that lasted 90mins.
It good to see this happening but at the moment it’s pretty expensive and there are questions on how demand can be sustained.
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