First flight powered by 'eco-fuel' takes off from UK but experts are unconvinced
The world's first commercial long haul flight powered entirely by 'sustainable aviation fuel' (SAF) has taken off.
Virgin Atlantic’s historic flight launched off from London Heathrow to New York JFK at 11.30am, marking the culmination of a year long project designed to "demonstrate the capability of SAF as a safe drop-in replacement for fossil derived jet fuel, compatible with today’s engines, airframes and fuel infrastructure."
The plane is the first long-haul commercial jet to run completely off SAF. It is using a mix of 88% HEFA - Hydro processed Esters and Fatty Acids such as used cooking oil, waste animal fat and tallows - and 12% SAK - Synthetic Aromatic Kerosene from waste corn feed.
Virgin Atlantic claims this will reduce emissions by 70% compared to normal, kerosene aviation fuel. Given how polluting flying is - with a return flight from London to New York producing the same amount of green house gases per passenger as a twelfth of an average Brits' yearly carbon footprint - SAF is seen by some as a major part of the future of aviation.
The plane was powered with two types of waste product (Virgin)The UK Government invested £1million into the Virgin Atlantic project and will mandate that 10% of jet fuel must come from sustainable sources by 2030. Earlier this month it announced that nine projects will receive £53 million to "help scale up the UK SAF production industry".
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Mark Harper, the Transport Secretary, was on today's flight and - echoing the 'Cakeism' made popular by former boss Boris Johnson - said it showed "how we can both decarbonise transport and enable passengers to keep flying when and where they want."
Not everyone is as enthusiastic as the minister however. Climate scientists and aviation experts have spoken to the Mirror about the many problems they believe SAF will face, while arguing that promotion of it is a form of greenwashing.
One report claims that airlines have lobbied the UK government to provide an annual £2bn tax break to subsidise SAF. This is despite normal jet fuel not being taxed at all in the UK.
Matt Finch, UK Policy Manager at Transport and Environment, said: "The blunt truth is that some so-called sustainable aviation fuels just are not sustainable. Incredibly, some could end up increasing overall emissions, by diverting SAF feedstocks away from better uses. The Government knows this, and should simply ban those from being used in UK planes. The airlines also know this, and by continuing to use dodgy fuel made from dodgy feedstocks, they are just greenwashing us.
"The SAF mandate will be the biggest environmental regulation applied to UK aviation ever, and it would be downright odd if the Government allowed SAF to be made from feedstocks that have dubious or non-existent environmental benefits."
The Aviation Environment Federation (AEF) has listed three "hidden realities" it believes the aviation industry doesn't want consumers to know about SAF, which show the fuel type is not the future of clean flying.
Their first claim is that 100% SAF reduces tailpipe emissions by 0% compared with using kerosene. SAFs actually produce the same volume of CO2 emissions as kerosene when burned. It is during the production of them when 'net' emission savings can be made.
As most SAF is made from waste that already existed, no extra CO2 is pulled from the atmosphere by the plants used to make it than if the waste was less doing nothing. Questions have also been raised about where the 26 million litres of SAF supplied to airlines in the UK last year came from. Around 80% was made from imported “used cooking oil”, primarily from countries in Asia, where its authenticity has been questioned.
Another concern is that scaling up will be a challenge; SAF supply is still very limited and currently accounts for just 2.6% of total UK aviation fuel use, while the current available supply is less than one-thousandth of the total volume of jet fuel used worldwide.
UK has set a target of eliminating biological waste going to landfill meaning less to make SAF from, and many so-called wastes already have other uses.
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The key alternative on the table – synthetic e-fuel – can be produced from captured carbon combined with green hydrogen. However, this is only being produced in tiny quantities as it’s much more expensive than fuel from waste and needs a large amount of renewable energy.
According to a Royal Society report, the UK would have to devote half its farmland or more than double its total renewable electricity supply to make enough aviation fuel of either kind to achieve net zero flying.
The third is that SAF hype may lead to more flying. The independent Climate Change Committee has said the Government's plan to cut aviation emissions relies too heavily on emerging tech and fuels, and not enough on encouraging people not to fly. Many climate scientists argue this is the only way to lower emissions at the pace we need to to limit global average temperature rises to 1.5C.
Cait Hewitt, the policy director of AEF, said: “The idea that this flight somehow gets us closer to guilt-free flying is a joke. Hopefully, we’ll have better technological solutions in future but, for now, the only way to cut CO2 from aviation is to fly less.”
Others are much more enthusiastic. Sir Richard Branson, Founder, Virgin Atlantic said: “The world will always assume something can’t be done, until you do it. The spirit of innovation is getting out there and trying to prove that we can do things better for everyone’s benefit.
“Virgin Atlantic has been challenging the status quo and pushing the aviation industry to never settle and do better since 1984. Fast forward nearly 40 years, that pioneering spirit continues to be Virgin Atlantic’s beating heart as it pushes the boundaries from carbon fibre aircraft and fleet upgrades to sustainable fuels.
“I couldn’t be prouder to be onboard Flight100 today alongside the teams at Virgin Atlantic and our partners, which have been working together to set the flight path for the decarbonisation of long-haul aviation.”
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