The U.S. Air Force wants its fleet certified to fly on a synthetic fuel blend by 2011, and has begun testing in earnest, including a flight last week on a C-17.

"We've developed a three-part energy strategy," William Anderson, assistant secretary of the Air Force for installations, environment and logistics, told media at a Foreign Press Center briefing in Washington Oct. 26. "We're looking to reduce demand, find alternative supply sources and change the culture of every airman so they make energy a consideration in all that they do."

Petroleum-based fuel currently consumes 81 percent of the service's $7 billion energy budget, and the Air Force hopes to pressure industry into producing environmentally friendly synthetic fuel blends as a replacement.

Anderson said the Air Force is "not in the business of producing [synthetic] fuel, and we have no intention to do so," but he believes the service has enough purchasing power to force the market into producing it. Rising fuel costs have a "significant" impact on Air Force budgets, Anderson added. "For every $10 increase in the price of oil per barrel, it costs the Air Force $610 million."

The Air Force is working closely with FAA to certify the commercial and Air Force fleets to fly on a 50-50 combination of synthetic fuel (liquid derived from coal) and petroleum-based fuel by 2011. "Currently every test indicates that jet engines can fly on a blend of synthetic and standard fuel...and it can be done with no modifications and no impact," Anderson said. "We're even getting slightly better engine performance because of fewer contaminants."

The blended fuel has yet to be tested in afterburners, however, so starting in November, it will be run through an F-101's GE engine. The engine will be taken out of rotation and the blend will be pushed through the test stand, with ground tests complete by the end of 2007.

"Then the engine will be taken apart and analyzed," Anderson said. "It will probably be another year before those airplanes go up with synthetic fuel. We have to see the tear-down [of the engine] and review it before we move forward."

The first aircraft to test fly the synthetic fuel blend was a B-52 that, on Sept. 19, ran two engines on a blend of crude-oil fuel and Fischer-Tropsch fuel derived from natural gas, with its other six engines operating on pure JP-8 (DAILY, Aug. 13). On Oct. 25, a C-17 flew at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., with a blend of the fuels in all four of its tanks. The B-1 bomber will begin ground tests of the synthetic fuel blend in November.