Focus on fuel production

September 2022

Development of turbine fuels from sustainable feedstocks

Some of the process pathways for fuel production enable the use of under-utilized ligno-cellulose waste and side streams from forestry, paper and pulping, and agriculture, as feedstocks for producing alternative fuels, which is of interest to countries like Sweden, Finland, Canada, Russia, and Brazil with large forest industry sectors and access to abundant biomass residues beyond the likewise important non-food/feed residues from agriculture. Analyses indicate that forest residues are Sweden's largest raw material source for the production of renewable fuels. It is estimated that the total energy from agriculture and forestry side streams can reach 45-80 TWh, not jeopardizing ecological, economic, and technical sustainability. Diedrichs propose that the rate of conversion to biojetfuel is 25%, which means that we can extract 12-20 TWh in sustainable turbine fuel. This provides an oppor-tunity for Swedish aviation, using 1.4 million m3 fuel. The development of tech-niques to cost-effectively convert lignocellulose to alternative turbine fuels is an opportunity for Sweden from a sustainability and security-of-supply perspective. Investment in this development benefits the Swedish industry and moves us closer to the sustainability goals, benefitting society and the environment.

Contact

Linda Sandström
Work package leader, WP2 Enhetschef Research Institute of Sweden (RISE)
Martin Hedberg
Workpackage Coordinator of CESTAP, Researcher at Research Institute of Sweden (RISE), Södertälje
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