WASHINGTON - Later this year, a giant US Air Force B-52 bomber will take off with a new kind of jet fuel that can be derived from coal or natural gas, setting the stage for the US military to eventually burn a new formula that is not derived from crude oil.
In September, a B-52 Stratofortress will fly from Edwards Air Force Base in California with two of its eight engines burning a mix of half oil-derived JP8 fuel and half a clean-burning alternative made from natural gas.
The US military's foray into the alternate fuel market could spell relief for US commercial airlines who have seen their fuel bills double since 2001.
"It's a way to signal the industry that we're interested in starting to purchase large quantities," said Bill Harrison, a fuel expert at the Air Force Research Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio.
Tulsa, Oklahoma-based Syntroleum Corp. will supply 100,000 gallons of the "Fischer-Tropsch" fuel derived from natural gas for the three B-52 fuel tests.
The fuel, which bears the name of the two German researchers who engineered it -- can also be made from crude oil substitutes like coal and even plant matter.
The fuel, which was used by Germany during World World II, has seen a resurgence.
That's partly because the United States has a 250-year supply of coal that politicians have seized on as a way to break the nation's dependence on oil imports, which make up about 60 percent of US petroleum supplies.
According to studies by the US Energy Department and Department of Defense, the alternative fuel is economic to use when oil prices are around US$50 a barrel -- well below current levels above US$70 a barrel.
The US military wants to buy up to 200 million gallons of alternative synthetic aviation fuel in 2008.
That would be only a fraction of the 5 billion gallons of jet fuel the military burns every year, but it could nudge the US industry toward more wide-scale production, Harrison told Reuters in an interview.
"We feel it's a large enough quantity to get the industry interested," Harrison said.
The Air Force wants to eventually certify its entire fleet of airplanes to burn alternative fuels, Harrison said.
The US government is looking to build a new breed of low-emission electric power plant that runs on gasified coal. Those plants could also be geared to produce jet fuel and other petroleum products like gasoline, he said.
US passenger and cargo carriers, which burned nearly 20 billion gallons of jet fuel in 2005, are paying attention.
That's because every penny increase in jet fuel prices costs them about US$200 million in extra annual operating costs, according to the Air Transport Association of America.
David Neeleman, chief executive of JetBlue Airways Corp. , has said the carrier is studying the possibility of using coal-based methanol.
And South African company Sasol Ltd. already produces a 50/50 synthetic fuel blend which fuels aircraft that fly out of Johannesburg International Airport.
Story by Chris Baltimore
REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
