Blatant Reality

A recent RAND study claims that the the military basically shouldn’t waste their time with new alternative energy sources like algae camelina. From a NYT article:

The United States would derive no meaningful military benefit from increased use of alternative fuels to power its jets, ships and other weapons systems, according to a government-commissioned study by the RAND Corporation scheduled for release Tuesday.

The report also argued that most alternative-fuel technologies were unproven, too expensive or too far from commercial scale to meet the military’s needs over the next decade.

However, not everyone agrees with this assessment, including the U.S. Navy. From the same article:

RAND’s conclusions drew swift criticism from some branches of the military — particularly the Navy, which has been leading the foray into advanced algae-based fuels.

“Unfortunately, we were not engaged by the authors of this report,” said Thomas W. Hicks, deputy assistant secretary of energy for the Navy. “We don’t believe they adequately engaged the market,” he said, adding, “This is not up to RAND’s standards.”

The Mary Rosenthal, Executive Director of the Algal Biomass Organization, also issued a statement blasting this study.

Today, the RAND Corporation published a study and accompanying press release calling into question the effectiveness of renewable fuels for military use.

The report can be found here: http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monographs/2011/RAND_MG969.pdf

A copy of the press release can be found here: http://www.rand.org/news/press/2011/01/25.html

“It is our understanding that researchers at RAND did not reach out to any of the leading algae companies. Given that most of the cutting edge algae-fuels research is taking place today in the private sector where companies rightly protect their intellectual property, and given that the industry has made significant progress in the past three years, we believe the report is likely based on outdated information. In our opinion, basing sweeping policy recommendations on such data is misguided if not reckless.

The positioning of the entire US algae industry as a “research topic” is patently false. We have more than 100 companies, academic institutions and national laboratories working to develop the algae-to-fuels industry. Algae-derived fuels have already been tested and/or used in motor vehicles and commercial aircraft, and last fall’s successful test of a Navy Riverine Command boat showed that algae fuels are ready for use. It is unclear to us whether or not any actual “green” CTL fuels have been produced or tested.

We believe algae commercialization is far closer than RAND suggests. A 2010 report by Greentech Media Research projected annual US production of 6 billion gallons of algae fuel by 2022. On the contrary, the RAND report calls the potential for commercial production of CTL fuels over the next decade “very limited.”

We will continue to work on behalf of the US algae industry to inform policymakers of the true potential of algae-based fuels as a long term, viable source of renewable fuels for the military.”

Unlike last week when I mistakenly announced that a helicopter had flown on algal fuels, a helicopter running on a 50-50 biofuel/traditional fuel mix was successfully test flown yesterday. The biofuel used in the test flight was a mixture of algae and used cooking oil that were converted into Honeywell’s “Green Jet Fuel”. Check out the press release:

UOP LLC, a Honeywell (NYSE: HON) company, announced today that Honeywell Green Jet Fuel™ produced using its Green Jet Fuel process technology powered a Boeing AH-64D Apache helicopter flown by the Royal Netherlands Air Force.

The flight, which is the first helicopter flight using sustainable aviation biofuels to date, was conducted at Gilze-Rijen Airbase, the home of the Royal Netherlands’ combat helicopter fleet. Natural oils from algae and used cooking oil were converted into Green Jet Fuel using process technology developed by Honeywell’s UOP. The aviation biofuel was blended in a 50 percent mixture with traditional jet fuel, and this blend was used to power one of the Apache’s engines for a series of test maneuvers. No modifications were made to the engine or airframe for the flight.

“We congratulate the Royal Netherlands Air Force on this first successful helicopter flight and applaud their commitment to identifying new, sustainable sources for aviation biofuel,” said Jim Rekoske, vice president and general manager for the Renewable Energy and Chemicals business of Honeywell’s UOP. “We continue to show through testing and demonstrations the viability of biofuels for both military and commercial aviation.”

Honeywell Green Jet Fuel has been used in four previous commercial biofuel demonstration flights, including a KLM Royal Dutch Airlines demonstration flight in November 2009. The fuel has also been demonstrated in fixed-wing flights with the U.S. Air Force and Navy as part of a joint program for alternative fuels testing and certification under the U.S. Defense Energy Support Center (DESC).

The process technology was originally developed in 2007 under a contract from the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to produce renewable military jet fuel for the U.S. military. The process produces an aviation biofuel that can be blended seamlessly with petroleum-based fuel. As part of a 50 percent blend with petroleum-derived jet fuel, Green Jet Fuel is a drop-in replacement that requires no changes to the aircraft technology and meets all critical specifications for flight.

Honeywell’s UOP business, a recognized global leader in process technology to convert petroleum feedstocks to fuels and chemicals, is developing a range of processes to produce green fuels from natural feedstocks. In addition to its Green Jet Fuel process technology, the company has commercialized the UOP/Eni Ecofining™ process to produce Honeywell Green Diesel™ from biological feedstocks. It has also a joint venture with Ensyn Corp. in Envergent Technologies LLC, which offers pyrolysis technology for the production of renewable heat, power and transportation fuels.