Yeah, lets grow jet fuel instead of food. **** the starving, I want to fly to Jamaica with ego-friendly jet fuels.
The seeds for a new kind of jet biofuel are being grown right here in Saskatchewan.
Biojet flight tests are currently taking place in Ottawa using a fuel blend derived from Agrisoma's Brassica carinata variety Resonance.
The project is a collaboration with Agrisoma, the National Research Council, Honeywell UOP Inc. and Saskatoon's Genome Prairie-led Prairie Gold project.
Resonance, an oil feedstock, was grown near Kincaid in the summer of 2011.
Brassica carinata (Ethiopian mustard) is drought and heat tolerant and can be grown in areas not suited for canola, for instance, said Mejda Lortie, Agrisoma's director of regulatory and government affairs.
"It is a tough cookie," she said. "It can grow in poorer soils or soil that doesn't have the characteristics that would support, for example, canola production."
Doug Heath, project manager with Genome Prairie, said the carinata and also camalina are being developed for industrial uses.
Both are oilseeds and non-food crops.
"The goal is to grow both of these crops down in the Palliser Triangle area where traditionally canola wasn't always a guaranteed crop," Heath said. "Even though right now it takes a few more days to mature compared to canola, that's fine down in southern Saskatchewan and southern Alberta.
The goal is to have a more ego-friendly fuel.
The test flights, conducted in partnership with the National Research Council of Canada (NRC) in Ottawa with funding from the Government of Canada's Clean Transportation Initiatives, will evaluate the Resonance-based biojet fuel under a number of flight conditions to provide the world's first ever real-time, inflight emissions measurements for a biojet fuel.
The tests are being done with a 50/50 blend of carinata jet fuel and petroleum based fuel which is being used in a modified Falcon 20 twin-engined jet. A T-33 chase plane equipped to measure inflight emissions while flying in formation will monitor emissions in real time at altitude.
"It's not just a jet engine on the ground making extrapolations on," Heath said. "It's actually measuring what's coming out of the jet as it's flying."
"We all assume there is a reduction in greenhouse gases emissions, but nobody has really measured it in the atmosphere," Lortie added. "This program is the first one that will using our jet fuel will be able to measure the emissions during a flight."
The test flights are expected to be completed by early June and they will analyze the results.
If they get positive results Lortie said they will be looking to scale up production in the coming years.
"It is expanding the portfolio of some growers, especially in the southern parts of Saskatchewan, giving them an alternative to leaving their land on fallow," she said.
The seeds for a new kind of jet biofuel are being grown right here in Saskatchewan.
Biojet flight tests are currently taking place in Ottawa using a fuel blend derived from Agrisoma's Brassica carinata variety Resonance.
The project is a collaboration with Agrisoma, the National Research Council, Honeywell UOP Inc. and Saskatoon's Genome Prairie-led Prairie Gold project.
Resonance, an oil feedstock, was grown near Kincaid in the summer of 2011.
Brassica carinata (Ethiopian mustard) is drought and heat tolerant and can be grown in areas not suited for canola, for instance, said Mejda Lortie, Agrisoma's director of regulatory and government affairs.
"It is a tough cookie," she said. "It can grow in poorer soils or soil that doesn't have the characteristics that would support, for example, canola production."
Doug Heath, project manager with Genome Prairie, said the carinata and also camalina are being developed for industrial uses.
Both are oilseeds and non-food crops.
"The goal is to grow both of these crops down in the Palliser Triangle area where traditionally canola wasn't always a guaranteed crop," Heath said. "Even though right now it takes a few more days to mature compared to canola, that's fine down in southern Saskatchewan and southern Alberta.
The goal is to have a more ego-friendly fuel.
The test flights, conducted in partnership with the National Research Council of Canada (NRC) in Ottawa with funding from the Government of Canada's Clean Transportation Initiatives, will evaluate the Resonance-based biojet fuel under a number of flight conditions to provide the world's first ever real-time, inflight emissions measurements for a biojet fuel.
The tests are being done with a 50/50 blend of carinata jet fuel and petroleum based fuel which is being used in a modified Falcon 20 twin-engined jet. A T-33 chase plane equipped to measure inflight emissions while flying in formation will monitor emissions in real time at altitude.
"It's not just a jet engine on the ground making extrapolations on," Heath said. "It's actually measuring what's coming out of the jet as it's flying."
"We all assume there is a reduction in greenhouse gases emissions, but nobody has really measured it in the atmosphere," Lortie added. "This program is the first one that will using our jet fuel will be able to measure the emissions during a flight."
The test flights are expected to be completed by early June and they will analyze the results.
If they get positive results Lortie said they will be looking to scale up production in the coming years.
"It is expanding the portfolio of some growers, especially in the southern parts of Saskatchewan, giving them an alternative to leaving their land on fallow," she said.
