Used cooking oil can be turned into sustainabe aviation fuel. SAF.
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Less than a fortnight after the final 747 rolled off the assembly line in the US, Rolls-Royce debuted its biggest ever jet engine – just about able to pass through a London Underground tunnel.
Rolls Royce ultrafan engine - Rolls-Royce© Rolls-Royce
As Boeing ditches the Jumbo Jet for lack of interest, Rolls-Royce is hoping UltraFan, unveiled on Monday, will help it to solve the problem of green air travel.
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While aviation accounts for about 2.5pc of carbon dioxide emissions, the industry is under pressure to move towards zero emissions by 2050.
Around the world, engineers are attempting to crack the seemingly impossible challenge of fuelling long-haul flying without generating large emissions.
For smaller craft, top-end batteries can be used for the shortest, taxi-like routes and hydrogen at low pressure may be deployed for short-haul flights.
For long-haul, the hardest to decarbonise, jet fuel offers an unbeatable package of stable energy storage and efficiency.
Hydrogen can offer more energy and a lower carbon footprint, but must be stored at incredibly low temperatures for the longest routes.
A synthetic version of jet fuel can, with a few small modifications, power existing jet engines. As well as recycling carbon dioxide, Sustainable Aviation Fuel, known as SAF, produces less in the way of particles that are blamed for helping warm the earth. SAF is likely to be needed for long-haul flights until technology catches up.
However, in current engines it costs five times as much as its fossil fuel counterpart. No business in their right mind would make the switch – or survive for long if they did.
rolls-royce ultrafan - Steve M Smith FBIPP© Provided by The Telegraph
Rolls-Royce is aiming to narrow the cost gap with the UltraFan.
The engine will be 25pc more fuel efficient than its 1990s-era predecessor. It achieves this by being very big – 3.5m across. Rather than shifting air more quickly, as other incrementally better engines have in the past, it will shift more air through a bigger fan, thus improving efficiency.
Simon Burr, director of product development and technology at Rolls-Royce, says that this strategy, combined with falling SAF prices as technology improves, offers the potential to get “much, much closer” in price to jet fuel, he says. And with it, bring the prospect of guilt-free flying closer.
The fuel that will be used in UltraFan testing is made from used cooking oil. This is not a long-term solution because there will never be enough to fuel the world’s planes.
However, SAF can be made in a number of ways, says Andrew Cornell, chief executive at Advanced Biofuel Solutions, which is developing the means to make jet fuel from waste.
Household waste is the obvious raw material to use, he says. It is run through a number of chemical processes to make first gas and then liquid fuel which, just like oil, can be refined into jet fuel.
Biomass, another feedstock, is broadly carbon neutral because it starts off as plants capturing carbon dioxide.
“You're recycling carbon dioxide rather than generating new carbon dioxide,” he says.
This can be combined with carbon capture to reduce the carbon output of the
How the biggest ever jet engine built by Rolls-Royce is paving the way for an era of low-cost green flying
Story by Howard Mustoe • Tuesday631113 Comments
+0.64%
IN THIS ARTICLE
RR.▲ +0.64%
Less than a fortnight after the final 747 rolled off the assembly line in the US, Rolls-Royce debuted its biggest ever jet engine – just about able to pass through a London Underground tunnel.
Rolls Royce ultrafan engine - Rolls-Royce© Rolls-Royce
As Boeing ditches the Jumbo Jet for lack of interest, Rolls-Royce is hoping UltraFan, unveiled on Monday, will help it to solve the problem of green air travel.
Space Technology for Dirty Glasses (Now Available to The Public)
Ad
Peeps
While aviation accounts for about 2.5pc of carbon dioxide emissions, the industry is under pressure to move towards zero emissions by 2050.
Around the world, engineers are attempting to crack the seemingly impossible challenge of fuelling long-haul flying without generating large emissions.
For smaller craft, top-end batteries can be used for the shortest, taxi-like routes and hydrogen at low pressure may be deployed for short-haul flights.
For long-haul, the hardest to decarbonise, jet fuel offers an unbeatable package of stable energy storage and efficiency.
Hydrogen can offer more energy and a lower carbon footprint, but must be stored at incredibly low temperatures for the longest routes.
A synthetic version of jet fuel can, with a few small modifications, power existing jet engines. As well as recycling carbon dioxide, Sustainable Aviation Fuel, known as SAF, produces less in the way of particles that are blamed for helping warm the earth. SAF is likely to be needed for long-haul flights until technology catches up.
However, in current engines it costs five times as much as its fossil fuel counterpart. No business in their right mind would make the switch – or survive for long if they did.
rolls-royce ultrafan - Steve M Smith FBIPP© Provided by The Telegraph
Rolls-Royce is aiming to narrow the cost gap with the UltraFan.
The engine will be 25pc more fuel efficient than its 1990s-era predecessor. It achieves this by being very big – 3.5m across. Rather than shifting air more quickly, as other incrementally better engines have in the past, it will shift more air through a bigger fan, thus improving efficiency.
Simon Burr, director of product development and technology at Rolls-Royce, says that this strategy, combined with falling SAF prices as technology improves, offers the potential to get “much, much closer” in price to jet fuel, he says. And with it, bring the prospect of guilt-free flying closer.
The fuel that will be used in UltraFan testing is made from used cooking oil. This is not a long-term solution because there will never be enough to fuel the world’s planes.
However, SAF can be made in a number of ways, says Andrew Cornell, chief executive at Advanced Biofuel Solutions, which is developing the means to make jet fuel from waste.
Household waste is the obvious raw material to use, he says. It is run through a number of chemical processes to make first gas and then liquid fuel which, just like oil, can be refined into jet fuel.
Biomass, another feedstock, is broadly carbon neutral because it starts off as plants capturing carbon dioxide.
“You're recycling carbon dioxide rather than generating new carbon dioxide,” he says.
This can be combined with carbon capture to reduce the carbon output of the
