Perhaps burning lard, the fuel for your plane | fat | lard
Airlines may soon use fuel made from animal fat to help them achieve climate goals. However, a report released by the EU Transport and Environment Organization on May 31st warns that this may increase rather than decrease carbon emissions.
EU regulations encourage the use of animal fats as fuel and require airlines to increase the proportion of "sustainable aviation fuels" by 2030. Several oil companies have announced plans to use animal fat to produce aviation fuel, and it is expected that animal fat will become the second largest source of so-called sustainable aviation fuel, following edible oil.
However, there are two main issues with converting animal fat into aviation fuel to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The first major issue is that although animal fat is a waste product of the meat processing industry, it has already been used. The author and analyst of the report, Chris Malins, said, "To a large extent, the biodiesel industry uses some underutilized waste edible oils, but this is different from animal fats."
In 2006, the meat processing industry in the UK and EU produced approximately 2.4 million tons of refined or purified fats.
These fats are used in the manufacturing of pet food, soap, and other products in roughly the same proportion, and are used to generate heat and electricity, with only a small portion being converted into biodiesel.
In 2021, the UK and EU produced approximately 2.8 million tons of refined fat, nearly half of which was converted into biodiesel, mainly used in cars and trucks, and the rest for pet food and cosmetics. Almost no direct use for heating and power generation.
This means that if the aviation industry starts using so-called sustainable aviation fuels made from a large amount of animal fat, the amount of fat used for these existing purposes will decrease. Malins said that the cosmetics and pet food industry may choose palm oil because palm oil is the cheapest product with similar characteristics.
The report states that this means more forests will be cut down to produce more palm oil, which could lead to a 70% increase in carbon emissions compared to continuing to use fossil fuels to power airplanes.
The second main issue is that using animal fat based fuels provides a relatively inexpensive and simple way for the aviation industry to achieve its goal of increasing the use of "sustainable aviation fuels". Malins said that this is an alternative to investing in more expensive but better methods such as cellulose biofuels. Due to the low amount of animal fat, this is not a long-term solution. By 2030, the EU's demand for aviation fuel is expected to reach approximately 46 million tons of crude oil per year. Malins estimates that even if all animal fat produced by the European Union is converted into aviation fuel, it can only cover up to 3% of it.
In addition, there is a broader issue. Unlike planting biomass as energy, using waste biomass is truly green and environmentally friendly. But most of the usable waste biomass is being used, so measures aimed at encouraging the use of waste may have unexpected negative effects.
For example, the EU encourages the conversion of used edible oils into biofuels, which has led Asian countries to export "second-hand" edible oils previously used as animal feed to the EU. As a result, these countries have to replace these exported oils with other products, thereby increasing carbon emissions. Environmentalists claim that in some cases, unused oil is even exported as second-hand edible oil. Similarly, many of the "waste wood" burned in power plants may not be waste at all.
In fact, besides improving energy efficiency, the only way to reduce aviation emissions in the short term is to make people fly less.
