Project description
Alternative aviation fuel research
To fulfil the 2015 Paris Agreement goals, the aviation industry should adopt solutions to reduce emissions. Sustainable organic-origin fuels whose life cycle carbon footprint is smaller than the fossil-origin kerosene are widely envisaged as the only short-medium term solution for the aviation industry. The past decade has seen a lot of research and experiments on organic products, with excellent results. However, the new products are submitted to strict certification procedures while their production is costly, with results that cannot compete economically with fossil kerosene at the present oil prices. The EU-funded ALTERNATE project is a Chinese-EU proposal that aims to identify the possibilities for extensive sustainable fuel use in aviation considering new technical areas and production procedures.
Objective
It is widely accepted that the use of sustainable fuels, with a Life-cycle carbon footprint substantially smaller than the present fossil-origin kerosene, is the most promising and probably the only short-medium time measure allowing the aviation industry to reduce its emissions, helping to reach 2015 Paris Agreement targets.
During the last 10 years, many tests have been done with different drop-in organic products with high level of success. Present commercial aircraft engines are certified for using a mix of up to 50% of some of these new products. More additional research is still going on the convenience of developing new feedstocks and on their potential climate change impact.
The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) is now discussing the best way to standardise the Life-cycle Analysis (LCA) of the most readily available products and what is the best certification procedures. This process is needed in order to apply CORSIA (Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation), approved in October 2016, intending to stabilize international aviation carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions at 2020 levels.
However, none of those new organic-origin fuels has proved the means to be produced in an economically competitive way versus fossil kerosene. It is generally accepted that some type of incentive mechanism needs to be implemented to make sustainable fuel attractive for the airlines in addition to the CORSIA and European Trading System provisions.
As the result of this Chinese and European cooperation proposal, some possibilities appear for a wider aviation sustainable fuel utilisation, considering both technical and economic areas, including the possible use of more feedstocks and production pathways than the existing ones. New fuel candidates will be evaluated in this project according to improved modelling methods, considering LCA optimization, climate change effects and technical and economic consequences of their use.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- engineering and technology environmental engineering energy and fuels liquid fuels
- engineering and technology mechanical engineering vehicle engineering aerospace engineering aircraft
- natural sciences earth and related environmental sciences atmospheric sciences climatology climatic changes
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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H2020-EU.3.4. - SOCIETAL CHALLENGES - Smart, Green And Integrated Transport
MAIN PROGRAMME
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Topic(s)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
RIA - Research and Innovation action
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) H2020-MG-2018-2019-2020
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
28040 MADRID
Spain
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.