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Clean energy conference touts biofuels
By Kevin McCullen, Herald staff writer
KENNEWICK -- Commercial and military aircraft one day could be powered by biofuels, including an oil from a plant grown in Eastern Washington, as the airline industry and the Defense Department seek renewable and cleaner fuel sources.
Boeing, in partnership with airlines, has conducted five test flights of commercial aircraft powered in part by alternative fuels.
The airline industry is moving toward a goal of reducing petroleum use as a cost-saving and energy security issue and to reduce its carbon footprint, said Richard Wynne, director of geopolitical and policy analysis for Boeing.
Wynne, speaking Monday to the 10th Harvesting Clean Energy Conference at Three Rivers Convention Center in Kennewick, said biofuels supplied from 20 percent to 50 percent of the fuel on the test flights.
Dutch air carrier KLM also used biofuels on a 747 with passengers aboard.
Airline and aircraft manufacturers that are part of Airline Transportation Action Group have committed by 2015 to making biofuels 1 percent -- about 500 million to 600 million gallons -- of their annual fuel consumption, he said. Worldwide, fuel comprises 25 percent of the operating costs for airliners, Wynne said.
"It's a daunting public challenge for us," he said.
The focus of the conference, which concludes today, is to promote economic development in the rural Northwest through clean energy development and production.
And one of the most promising of the biofuel products for aviation use is camelina, an oil-seed and nonfood crop that's being grown in rotation with wheat in Eastern Washington.
Camelina, which doesn't need much water and thrives in marginal soils, shows the most immediate promise of available biofuels for use in aircraft, Wynne said.
In December, AltAir Fuels of Seattle announced that it had an agreement with 14 airlines to supply 750 million gallons of jet and diesel fuel derived from camelina at a refinery in Anacortes.
Another firm, Sustainable Oils, has a two-year contract with the Navy and Air Force to supply the services with camelina-derived biofuels from crops grown in Eastern Washington, said Scott Johnson, president and general manager of the North Carolina-based company. In fact, the Navy is looking to power its ships, aircraft and vehicles partly with one source of biofuels, he said.
"Camelina is available and our production can be scaled up," said Johnson, whose company has contracts currently with about 50 Eastern Washington farmers.
Wood and agricultural byproducts -- including straw, grape pomace and hop residue -- and food waste also one day could be tapped to produce small amounts of electricity, a speaker at another panel said.
There are an estimated 17 million tons annually of so-called biomass material available in Washington, including 2 million tons annually in Benton, Franklin, Yakima, Walla Walla and Klickitat counties, said Jon Scott, chairman and co-founder of Woodinville-based Evergreen Fuel Technologies, a renewable energy company.
The company has a gasification project to burn biomass pellets planned in the second quarter of this year with the Port of Benton, he said.
But the bulk of Washington's electrical power is supplied by conventional means, with dams accounting for 75 percent, followed by coal and natural gas, nuclear from the Columbia Generating Station and wind and solar, according to information presented by Terry L. Walton, director of energy and environmental programs at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.
Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash., told conference attendees that oil, coal, natural gas and nuclear power must remain part of the nation's energy package. Oil reserves in the U.S. and offshore need to be tapped, he said.
"We ought to be diversifying our portfolio as much as we can. We cannot ignore the world's supply of coal and oil," Hastings said. "If the issue is using carbon fuels in an environmentally safe way, we are getting better at that every year."
The conference wraps up today with sessions on renewable energy trends and job creation, energy innovation in food processing, the future of solar technologies in the Northwest.
-- Kevin McCullen: 509-582-1535; kmccullen@tricityherald.com
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