Teesside plant gets funding to create "green" jet fuel
Teesside is set to be part of groundbreaking new plans to turn household rubbish into jet fuel
Teesside is set to be part of groundbreaking new plans to turn household rubbish into jet fuel.
4 plants - one of them in the Tees Valley - is being awarded a share of a £165m pound fund to work on the project.
The successful projects include sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) plants in Teesside, Immingham and Ellesmere Port which will convert domestic and commercial waste.
A project in Port Talbot, South Wales, will convert steel mill off-gases into fuel and another scheme will develop a plant creating fuel using carbon captured from a gas-fired power station and hydrogen made from renewable electricity.
Transport Secretary Mark Harper said: “Using waste or by-products to refuel airliners sounds like a flight of fancy, but thanks to £165 million of Government funding it’s going to help us make guilt-free flying a reality.
“It’s exactly this kind of innovation that will help us create thousands of green jobs across the country and slash our carbon emissions.”
The Department for Transport said the five projects will produce over 300,000 tonnes of SAF a year, enough to fly to the moon and back an estimated 60 times.
The successful projects will also slash CO2 emissions by an average of 200,000 tonnes each year once fully up and running.
The latest allocation of cash from the advanced fuels fund came after the announcement Virgin Atlantic will operate the world’s first “net zero” transatlantic flight next year.
The airline secured £1 million of Government funding to fly a Boeing 787 jet from London Heathrow to New York JFK using SAF instead of kerosene.