Air Canada to join biofuel program

Air Canada will participate in Canada's Biojet Supply Chain Initiative (CBSCI), a three-year collaborative project with 14 stakeholder organizations to introduce 400,000 litres of sustainable aviation biofuel (biojet) into a shared fuel system at a yet-to-be-determined Canadian airport.

Previous Air Canada biofuel flights used biojet that was segregated and loaded separately into an aircraft via tanker truck. By contrast, CBSCI's objective is to start developing a more efficient operational framework that will introduce biojet into a multi-user, co-mingled airport fuel supply system.

The CBSCI project is a first in Canada and is aimed at creating a sustainable Canadian supply chain of biojet using renewable feedstocks. The biojet used in this project will be sourced from commercially available, certifiably sustainable Canadian oleochemical feedstocks using the Hydroprocessed Esters and a Fatty Acids (HEFA) conversion process. The biojet will be blended with petroleum jet fuel to meet all technical quality specifications before being introduced into a shared fuel tank at a Canadian airport. Air Canada is expecting to introduce approximately 400,000 litres of blended biofuel. The CBSCI project will also identify and help solve supply logistic barriers that arise when aviation biofuels are introduced at major Canadian airports.