A California startup says it has found a cheaper way to turn cow manure into sustainable aviation fuel, potentially opening a new pathway for airlines racing to meet emissions targets.

The six-month pilot transformed methane-rich gas from a California dairy farm’s manure digester into jet fuel that meets ASTM standards for commercial aviation.

The company estimates that commercial plants using its technology would cost roughly one-fifth as much as comparable facilities currently being developed in Europe.

According to the company, the pilot operated continuously for thousands of hours using untreated biogas composed of roughly 65 percent methane and 35 percent carbon dioxide. The process produced finished jet fuel that can blend with conventional Jet-A fuel at concentrations of up to 50 percent.

The company projects commercial installations could cost less than $100,000 per barrel per day of installed capacity. Those economics could allow SAF derived from dairy waste to compete directly with fossil-based jet fuel prices. “The hard part of this industry was never designing a theoretical plant that could make SAF,” said Dr. Stephen Beaton, founder and chief executive officer of Circularity Fuels. “It was proving you could do it continuously, from real biogas, at a cost that pencils.” He added that the company has now demonstrated the technology using “real feedstock from a real dairy farm.”

https://interestingengineering.com/energy/dairy-biogas-sustainable-aviation-fuel