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An Airbus A380 was flown on fuel derived from cooking oil
- metadat 4y ago> an Airbus A380 airliner was flown solely on fuel derived from cooking oil. Clickbaity, derived from cooking oil is a little different than flying on straight up cooking oil (like what diesel engines are capable of, just dump it in). I doubt there is enough [used] cooking oil on earth to power all the jet engines on a daily basis. Cool as a PoC, though.
- tyingq 4y agoKerosene freezes at -47°C. Cooking oil freezes at temperature ranges you're more likely to experience in an aircraft. I don't think we'll see any straight cooking oil jet aircraft.
- kylehotchkiss 4y agoWould you just dump used cooking engine into your engine? I’d imagine there’s a few particles that don’t burn off super cleanly and gunk up the pistons or valves or something
- stephen_g 4y agoIf you filter it well, you actually can run a diesel engine from waste cooking oil directly (but it's not great for it, which is why it's often converted to biodiesel or HVO/HEFA). The hydro-processing that HEFA/HVO (the kind of fuel used in the above trial) goes through is mostly for cold handling properties, viscosity, etc. - it actually makes it basically chemically identical to the fossil derived hydrocarbons that are normally used, which is pretty cool and interesting.
- tyingq 4y agoThe tricky part of cooking oil in engines is that it's higher viscosity / thicker than diesel. So straight cooking oil only really works well in the types of diesel engines that use glow plugs and swirl chambers...where the fuel gets fully atomized despite the high viscosity. Direct injection diesel engines have more trouble with cooking oil, with lots of deposits and gummy build up. The dirty bits aren't a big issue, other than for any fuel filters if you don't filter it first.
- bombcar 4y agoIt can be done: https://www.popsci.com/diy/article/2009-09/taking-chances/ https://www.popsci.com/diy/article/2009-09/taking-chances/ it's well known enough that the grease bins behind McDonalds and places now have locks, people were looting the oils
- dotancohen 4y agoWhy wouldn't McDonald's and places be thankful that somebody is disposing of their waste for them? Or do they do something productive with the contents of the grease bin?
- moltar 4y agoThey get money for it
- wahern 4y agoIt seems recycling grease is profitable enough that it's offered as a free service to restaurants. See, e.g., > > What does it cost me to be a DAR PRO Solutions customer? > In most cases, there is no signup or administrative fee for becoming a DAR PRO customer, though depending on market conditions, store location or other special circumstances, there may be a small delivery fee. This would be disclosed prior to finalizing any agreement. Normally, we provide the oil storage equipment and grease pick up at no charge to our customers under normal yellow grease market and operational conditions. Source: https://www.darpro-solutions.com/about-dar-pro-solutions/faqs-dar-pro-solutions https://www.darpro-solutions.com/about-dar-pro-solutions/faq... I wouldn't be surprised if a large company like McDonalds is able to recoup some of their costs by selling grease. Alternatively, even if the service is a net cost, as with residential recycling the service fee might offset by what the recycler can make from the waste, and so the recycler might require measures to safeguard their supply. Also, you might not want strangers rummaging through your bins as some of them might make a mess.
- kylehotchkiss 4y agoVery american answer: maybe somebody sues mcdonalds after stealing the used oil and it breaks their engine
- fy20 4y agoCar Throttle had a good video about it a few years ago: https://youtu.be/WNJH1rikujI https://youtu.be/WNJH1rikujI The most important point is you need an older car with mechanical injection (before ~2005). Modern diesels with electronic injection are much more sensitive to the fuel used, as they run at much higher pressure and components have tighter tolerances. On an older car, yes you can just dump it in after some crude filtering (e.g. with cheesecloth). I have a neighbour with an old Land Rover and he has been running it for years on cooking oil. Some people start on diesel then switch to cooking oil later. It has a higher viscousity at room temperature than diesel, so it works better once everything is warmed up.
- ge96 4y agoSewer oil industry will be booming
- Stevvo 4y agoA jet turbine is a diesel engine; you could run one on straight up cooking oil the same as any other diesel engine. The same principles apply you just have a combustion chamber instead of a cylinder.
- ummonk 4y agoCommercial aircraft engines run on kerosene formulations, not diesel.
- na85 4y agoCommon automotive Diesel fuel is a paraffin, just like JP-8/Jet A1. They're chemically pretty similar.
- fy20 4y agoYou can also run diesel cars and trucks on kerosene. The winter blend of diesel fuel in cold climates is a mixture of diesel and kerosene (which has a lower freezing temperature). Straight kerosene would work, but it is less lubricating that diesel fuel, so you need to mix some engine oil in with it to avoid damaging the engine. And on a modern car you are probably going to destroy any emissions control system, as kerosene has much higher sulfur than diesel.
- 2143 4y ago> You can also run diesel cars and trucks on kerosene. The winter blend of diesel fuel in cold climates is a mixture of diesel and kerosene (which has a lower freezing temperature). I know that Mercedes diesel sedans here in Asia has "NO ADDITIVES" written multiple times all around its inner fuel lid. I don't know for sure if Germany is considered to have cold climate, but if it is, I wonder if their diesel has kerosene and how that plays out with these engines. As I understand, Mercedes diesels are ubiquitous in some European countries (atleast as a taxi)?
- tyingq 4y agoHere's one winter diesel fuel I know is used in Germany (though this page is speaking to the Austrian market): https://www.omv.com/en/news/omv-maxxmotion-best-winter-diesel-fuel https://www.omv.com/en/news/omv-maxxmotion-best-winter-diese... It seems to include a "HVO bio component" (Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil).
- jaclaz 4y agoThe accent should be on the "solely". Mixing small quantities of fuel derived from cooking oil has been done before, even at industrial level: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2181821-how-to-make-jet-fuel-from-used-cooking-oil/ https://www.newscientist.com/article/2181821-how-to-make-jet...
- nsxwolf 4y agoCould you ever grow enough crops on Earth to replace jet fuel at current usage, without starving everyone to death? I have no idea how to evaluate this. How realistic is it?
- stephen_g 4y agoI think it's a bad idea. But I saw a statistic saying the waste oil collected now could satisfy about 2% of the demand, and I think if we looked at thermal depolymerisation and hydroprocessing of other biodegradable waste we could possibly get up to a decent chunk, maybe 20-30%? If done with zero emissions energy that would be pretty carbon neutral. Not sure where we go after that for aviation, it's definitely one of the most tricky applications for alternate fuels. Maybe efuels would be next for some portion. Hopefully electric aircraft can eventually do regional short haul but I'm not holding my breath on energy densities getting competitive for that to take a huge chunk of aviation any time soon...
- adrianN 4y agoSince plants are very bad at converting sunlight to oil, I would assume that it will always be much more space efficient to use solar panels and synthesize the fuel. But there is waste biomass, including oils, that can supplement a small fraction of our energy demands with little extra effort.
- sofixa 4y agoI think the idea is to use waste cooling oil, meaning oil that was already used for cooking, then blended with whatever to make it more usable as jet fuel and reused. So it wouldn't be a waste of crops, but reuse of a waste product already manufactured and used for other things.
- rob74 4y agoThat's nice in theory, but in practice most biofuels in use today are manufactured from food crops. So worries that producing kerosene from cooking oil might worsen the already existing food crisis are not completely unfounded. Related article from today: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jul/13/halt-use-of-biofuels-to-ease-food-crisis-says-green-group https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jul/13/halt-use...
- blinding-streak 4y agoDid the smoke detector go off? /s
- kelseyfrog 4y agoThey can fly an A380 on cooking oil, but can't phase out avgas? How does this make sense?
- TheSpiceIsLife 4y agoVastly different fuels. Jet engines run on a Jet A1, kinda like diesel or kerosene, ignites under pressure with oxygen. Avgas is a high octane (100) petrol that requires a spark for ignition. Last time I was reading about unleaded avgas it seemed to be mostly a regulatory inertia problem, though I'm not well versed in aviation engine requirements.
- hef19898 4y agoIn the case of cooking oil, it is (I assume, didn't check) a trial and neither the engine nor the oil are certified for regular flight. Even if ao, it most likely would be the specific engine that would be recertified, not the cooking oil derived fuel. AvGas is different, there it is not individual engines that get re certified for using lead free fuel (faster for each engine but impossible due to the agevand obsolescense of these old engines), so the fuel has to certified for all engines at the same time.
- Merad 4y agoThe issues are totally unrelated. Jet turbines have always been capable of running on almost any fuel. I would hazard a guess that what Airbus did here was mostly certifying that the alternative fuel wouldn't cause any major problems, maybe also things like tweaking the engine management systems to ensure consistent power output and throttle responsiveness with the new fuel. The problem with avgas is that there are a huge number of aviation piston engines still in use that were built with 1930s-1960s era technology (in some cases the engines themselves are literally that old) that were designed to use leaded gasoline. Getting those engines to run on unleaded gas would at best require extensive modifications to the engine and at worst just isn't possible. In the cases where it's possible, someone has to foot the bill to figure out how to modify the engines and get the changes certified with the FAA, both incredibly expensive propositions. Once that's done all of the owners will have to drop the money to upgrade their engines. The death of avgas is inevitable but unfortunately it's probably going to take some sectors of general aviation with it. Those older planes are still flying in large part because newer planes have gotten so incredibly expensive. Also from what I've read the warbird community is working on the problem but many of them aren't very optimistic about being able to get those big WW2 era engines to run unleaded.
- samhuk 4y agoI suppose one could say that the flight was well done, a rare achievement indeed.
- KennyBlanken 4y agoCooking oil is in such short supply (Ukraine produced much of the world's seed-derived cooking oil) that UK fish and chip shops were unable to get supplies. I've seen news reports of cooking oil thefts here in the US - restaurants being broken into for their frying or cooking oil. Trying to push these "solutions" is beyond irresponsible. People in many countries can't afford to eat, and we're turning food into fuel?
- jzwinck 4y agoThe fuel is made from used, waste oil. Not something you can cook with. The article explains this. Same is true when you read about cars and buses powered by cooking oil. They aren't going to the grocery store to buy the oil.
- josephcsible 4y agoIt runs on used cooking oil.
- TheSpiceIsLife 4y agoDiesel fuel thefts from road work equipment and farm machinery here in Australia have also recently spiked.
- yobbo 4y ago> Ukraine produced much of the world's seed-derived cooking oil Best I can find is that Ukraine accounts for as much as 50% of exported sunflower seed oil, which is different from "much of the world's seed-derived cooking oil" since almost all countries produce cooking oil domestically, and american imports are most likely from canada. https://www.ifpri.org/blog/impact-ukraine-crisis-global-vegetable-oil-market https://www.ifpri.org/blog/impact-ukraine-crisis-global-vege...
- 2000UltraDeluxe 4y agoThere's still cooking oil available but there's definitely less of it and at a higher price. The local stores here are out of the cheaper brands of rapeseed and sunflower oil.
- FooBarWidget 4y agoI wonder how viable it is to synthesize Kerosene or some other carbon fuel using renewable energy and some carbon source (stored factory exhaust?). Renewables are intermittent, but if the fuel synthesis process can also be intermittent then isn't that fine? Viola: you got a form of storage. Why does this not seem to be viable despite dropping costs of renewables?
- jabl 4y agoIt is possible, the search keywords are "synthetic fuels" or "e-fuels" ("electro-fuels). Currently it's a lot more expensive than fossil fuel, which is why it's mostly a research project and not a large-scale commercial business. One problem is that while you can get an unlimited amount of hydrogen via electrolysis of water, you have to get the carbon from somewhere to produce hydrocarbons. There is a lot of CO2 in the atmosphere, but it's still a pretty low concentration so it takes a lot of energy to filter it out. And yes, using factory exhaust etc. is an easier option, but if we're gonna solve climate change most CO2 exhaust sources have to be replaced at some point so that might not be a very long term plan.
- FooBarWidget 4y agoIs CO2 capturing the biggest problem that prevents it from being cost-effective?
- mcnugget 4y agoEnergy input is the other. It takes at minimum the combustion energy to reconfigure the molecules but most of the processes happen at high temperature and pressures which takes energy to do.
- FooBarWidget 4y agoI understand input is an issue, but why aren't renewables cheap enough to solve the energy input part of the problem? Don't solar panels cost next to nothing nowadays? How much must renewables decrease in cost in order for such fuels to be economically competitive?
- a-dub 4y agodoes the used cooking oil gas station in berkeley still exist?
- nanomonkey 4y agoBiofuel Oasis, yes! They still sell biodiesel.
- alkonaut 4y agoBiofuel from forest byproducts seems like a much more reasonable source than to use anything edible.
- JoeAltmaier 4y agoIt's just that we use 2B litres of cooking oil every year. They're always looking for something useful to do with used cooking oil.
- alkonaut 4y agoUsed cooking oil is a great product use because it’s basically waste. It’s a logistics nightmare though because it’s distributed and must be collected. Even if it’s free, it’s expensive.
- jgraham 4y agoThe problem with biofuels in general is that they're always sold as "from byproducts". But of course as soon as you set up a market for fuel it becomes a product in its own right. So they tend to drive the conversion of natural habitat into land managed like agricultural land, which has all the same problems as normal agriculture (habitat destruction, use of ecosystem-destroying pesticides, pollution from fertilizer runoff, soil erosion, etc.) and it's not even producing food. Land usage for food crops (destruction of tropical rainforest habitat for soy and palm oil, destruction of atlantic rainforest for sheep farming, etc.) is already contributing to a rate of species lost three orders of magnitude higher than the expected background rate. And there's a limit to how much we can eat; the amount we can burn as fuel is almost unlimited. "Sustainable" solutions that incentivise turning over more land to agriculture are nothing of the sort. And it's really the incentives that matter more than whether the initial prototypes are using existing byproducts.
- alkonaut 4y agoMy personal perspective growing up in Sweden is basically that there are thousands of trees per capita and the tragedy is that forests are slowly taking over old farmland. In the northern half of the country you can’t grow wheat due to the short season. It’s wildly different from the more densely populated parts of Europe, but in Russia and Canada there are probably tons of similar areas with spruce and pine forests the size of small countries have always grown, and where the climate is perfect for forests and bad for food crops. I don’t think there is ever a demand for forest byproducts where it would be profitable to grow trees where corn or wheat could be grown instead.
- poulpy123 4y agonow the only meal served in flight will be french fries with fried chicken
- FunnyBadger 4y agoWith farmers being attacked, there won't be cooking oil for this soon enough...
- credit_guy 4y agoThe obvious question is whether we could switch all aviation from jet fuel to cooking oil. Commercial aviation consumes about 200 million tons of jet fuel per year. The world annual production of palm oil (by far the highest yielding vegetable oil crop) is about 75 million tons. Can we expand this by a factor of 3.5? Currently palm trees for palm oil are planted on about 50 million acres of land. For comparison, in the US about 30 million acres are planted with corn for ethanol production.