Imagine turning farm waste and manure into high-quality jet fuel. Instead of letting these materials rot and release gases, this process cooks them under pressure to create a crude oil. Then, it cleans up that oil and uses green hydrogen to make it safe for airplanes, even helping to pull carbon out of the atmosphere.
Aviation requires massive volumes of sustainable fuels, but current options are often too expensive or lack the scale to replace fossil fuels. Additionally, agricultural waste like manure creates environmental liabilities that are costly to manage.
An integrated hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL) and wet oxidation (WO) pilot plant. A continuous hydrotreatment process to upgrade biocrudes into on-specification jet fuel.
If you are an airline dealing with strict carbon emission mandates — this project developed a pathway for on-specification jet fuel that can generate negative emissions. This allows you to reduce your fleet's carbon footprint using fuels derived from abundant agricultural residues.
If you are a farm operator dealing with regional manure surpluses and straw waste — this project developed a conversion process that turns these liabilities into marketable biocrudes. This transforms waste management costs into a potential revenue stream from fuel feedstocks.
If you are a refinery dealing with the high cost of heating biomass reactors — this project developed an integrated HTL-WO pilot plant that operates autothermally. This reduces process heat demand by using the energy from cleaning the process water to power the fuel production.
The project aims for cost-effectiveness by using abundant and low-cost feedstocks like manure and straw, particularly in areas with regional manure surpluses. It also reduces energy costs through autothermal operation of the integrated plant.
The project is demonstrating the process through an integrated HTL-WO pilot plant. Based on available project data, it is moving from lab-scale to pilot-scale demonstration to accelerate approval for civil aviation.
Based on available project data, the project focuses on developing innovative upgrading solutions for biocrudes and recovery strategies for CO2 and acetic acid, which represent potential intellectual property for licensing to refineries.
The process is designed to enable negative contributions to the GHG balance and targets nitrogen content of less than 10 ppm to meet jet fuel specifications.
The project period runs from 2023-01-01 to 2026-12-31, suggesting that final validated results and pilot data will be available by the end of 2026.
The consortium is well-balanced for technology transfer, consisting of 10 partners across 6 countries. With a 40% industry ratio (4 industrial partners, including 2 SMEs), the project ensures that the academic research from the 4 universities and 2 research institutes is grounded in commercial viability and industrial application.
Contact Bauhaus Luftfahrt EV in Germany for partnership opportunities.
Contact us to explore licensing the HTL-WO integrated process for your refinery.
