UK firm develops jet fuel made from human poo
The starting material is generated in excess and available in plenty. It is a win-win for everyone that the waste is repurposed.
Firefly Green Fuels, a company based in Bristol in the UK, has successfully demonstrated the development of an aviation fuel made from human waste. These are not just the company’s claims; independent tests by regulators in the aviation industry have also found the newly developed fuel is identical to that used in jet engines.
The aviation industry is responsible for two and a half percent of global carbon emissions. This might seem like a small number, but it is significant since there is a small proportion of individuals who fly, and the industry is only set to grow in the future.
Attempts to decarbonize the sector through the use of electric or hydrogen-powered planes are still in their infancy and are many years away from replacing large-sized planes that run on fossil fuels. This is why sustainable aviation fuels (SAF) are being developed as a stop-gap arrangement to continue using larger aircraft without adding to global emissions.
SAF from poo
Twenty years ago, James Hygate founded Firefly Green Fuels to make biodiesel from rapeseed oil that could power vehicles such as cars and trucks. The company now sells equipment to convert cooking oil into fuel all over the world. Hygate then focused his attention on using the same approach for jet engines, too.
The company attempted this with multiple different materials, such as used cooking oils, food waste, and even agricultural scrap, the BBC reported. But nothing yielded a favorable result. They then teamed up with Sergio Lima, a chemist at the Imperial College, London, to work with human waste as starting material.
Together, the research team developed a process to convert human waste into a thick, black liquid that looks like crude oil and behaves like it. Using fractional distillation, the team can then derive the fuel of interest, much like oil refineries do.
How much fuel can we generate?
The newly developed SAF was dispatched to a center in Germany, which confirmed its chemical composition to be similar to that of the A1 fuel used for jet engines.
Speaking to the BBC, Lima, who is also the research director at Firefly, claimed that the company had made net zero fuel. SAF made from crop products is usually considered a better alternative since the plants used to make the oil capture carbon dioxide from the air as they grow up. Experts estimate this to deliver up to a 90 percent reduction in emissions compared to fossil fuels.
Some are also opposed to crop-based SAF, insisting that limited land be utilized to grow crops to address food security rather than making jet fuel. Firefly’s approach, though, is unlikely to have opponents since human waste is something that cannot be avoided, is available in plenty, and is wanted by none.
According to Hygate’s calculations, a single flight from London to New York would need the fuel generated by processing annual sewage of 10,000 people. By processing the sewage of the entire UK region, Firefly can meet five percent of aviation fuel demand. That is well below the 10 percent mandate for SAF.
The company is now working to build a full-scale demonstrator plant in the UK.
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