A one-hour flight from Saarbrücken to Reims
Aviation gasoline, a one billion-litre market in Europe and the USA
A step towards the emergence of an aviation biofuel sector
Evry (France), 14 June 2021 – Global Bioenergies (Euronext Growth: ALGBE), a French company that develops petroleum derivative substitutes made from renewable resources, and Swift Fuel GmbH, a specialist in “green” aircraft fuels, are planning on 15 June 2021 the first international flight powered by a fuel made from over 97% renewable sources. A VAN RV_8 aircraft will leave Saarbrücken, Germany, and land at Reims en Champagne airfield (Prunay) during a ceremony attended by Jean Rottner, President of the Grand Est Region, Roland Theis, Saarland Secretary of State for Justice and Plenipotentiary for European Affairs, Catherine Vautrin, President of the Grand Reims urban community, and Arnaud Robinet, Mayor of Reims.
Composed of over 97% biofuel, the aviation gasoline used for this flight is an environmentally friendly alternative to the 100LL fuel usually marketed for piston-engine aircraft.
This technological achievement is the first step towards a bio-based aviation fuel market. Avgas (short for “aviation gasoline”), which is used for piston-engine aircraft, represents a market of 100 million litres per year in Europe and 900 million litres in the United States, or a total of one billion litres in those two markets alone. The gasoline developed by Swift Fuel for this historic flight is lead-free and made up of over 97% plant-based compounds produced by Global Bioenergies.
A bio-based aviation fuel, the result of over 10 years of R&D
Since 2008, Global Bioenergies has been developing a fermentation process for the conversion of renewable resources into isobutene and its derivatives, which are useful in areas as diverse as fuels, ingredients for cosmetics and materials. In 2014, the company set up a pilot plant in association with ARD at the Bazancourt-Pomacle agro-industrial complex near Reims, which brings together leaders in agricultural processing, such as Cristal Union and ADM. This was followed in 2017 by the inauguration of an industrial demo plant ten times larger on the Leuna refinery site in Germany. The company recently announced the establishment of a production unit based in Bazancourt-Pomacle, which is currently under construction.
Since 2011, Swift has been developing environmentally friendly aviation fuels with the main focus on unleaded alternatives for current 100LL. Five years ago, the company introduced UL 94 in the US marketplace, the first lead-free aviation gasoline for the majority of airplanes. Consequently, Swift conducted research on 100R, an unleaded fuel that can be used by the entire fleet and has a minimum of 10% renewable content. The certification by the FAA and subsequently other aviation authorities around the world is ongoing.
Grand Reims, a world-class bio-refinery cluster