fuel DTL-83133 specification), we have to remove the oxygen,” Aulich says. Therefore, the EERC was tasked to reevaluate how to produce a renewable fuel that would pass military muster—and one that’s “drop-in compatible” for the propulsion of everything from Humvees to jets.
The EERC anticipates that its renewable jet fuel currently under development, and the production process behind it, will not only satisfy the U.S. military’s drop-in compatibility, single battlefield-fuel and fit for purpose requirements, but it will eventually penetrate diesel fuel markets for commercial and civilian on-road diesel vehicles.
Bids, Awards, Deliverables In July 2006, DARPA issued a solicitation under its Biofuels Program for alternative fuels and efficiency options “to reduce the military’s reliance on traditional fuel for aircraft,” the agency said. The EERC was able to put a funding package together and have a project in place with assistance from soybean grower groups and North Dakota’s State Board of Agricultural Research and Education, Zygarlicke says. In December 2006, the EERC announced it was awarded $5 million to develop this renewable JP-8 surrogate. “There were 30 proposals and we were one of three awards,” Aulich says. Thomas Erickson, associate director of research at the EERC, says, “I would guess the other two are very near to entering agreements with DARPA.” One of the two is General Electric Global Research, according to DARPA. At press time, a third recipient hadn’t been named. In order to win the bid process, the EERC sufficiently demonstrated its abilities to meet the challenge. “We’ve demonstrated the initial concept viability already,” Aulich says. The center has the necessary lab equipment to process vegetable oils into anaerobic, short-chained and energy-dense renewable aviation fuel. The base feedstocks—virtually any source of triglycerides, free fatty acids and phospholipids—could come from a wide variety of vegetable oils, animal fats or aquaculture crops. Concerns over future feedstock supplies aren’t arbitrary, and
demands on supply chains from the mushrooming biodiesel sector have been recognized. Serious efforts to replace the U.S. military’s 5 billion- to 6 billion-gallon-annual fuel consumption puts even more pressure on an already limited supply. “That’s part of Erickson the new project, and the team being put together by [DARPA] is partially dedicated to looking at feedstocks,” Zygarlicke tells Biomass Magazine, adding that EERC researchers are looking at more than one feedstock. “We’re not ready to share what those are now, but the military has a very progressive mindset on this.” Aulich says the combination of feedstock availability and the production process are critical to making this whole approach viable. The project deliverables are “200 liters of our best fuel for the military to test,” he says, even though DARPA only requires 100 liters for testing. “The military is really going to put this thing through a rough set of standards, and they are really going to look it over from a lot of different angles.”
Fit for Purpose The EERC anticipates that its renewable jet fuel currently under development, and the production process behind it, will not only satisfy the U.S.
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