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The Air Transport Association of America, Inc. (ATA), the industry trade organization for the leading U.S. airlines, announced earlier this week that eight of its member airlines have signed an agreement with Rentech, Inc. and Aircraft Service International Group (ASIG) to purchase up to 1.5 million gallons per year of renewable synthetic diesel fuel (RenDiesel) for use in ground service equipment at Los Angeles International Airport, beginning in late 2012, when Rentech's plant to produce the fuel is scheduled to go into service.
The initial airline purchasers of RenDiesel are Alaska Airlines, American Airlines, Continental Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Southwest Airlines, United Airlines, UPS Airlines and US Airways, with the potential for adding other airline partners.
The renewable RenDiesel will be produced at the commercial-scale facility that Rentech is developing in Rialto, California, primarily from urban woody green waste such as yard clippings. The fuel is expected to have a low carbon footprint and minimal particulates.
ASIG, which provides fueling services to many airlines that operate at LAX, will handle receipt and dispensing of the RenDiesel. Other discussions regarding potential alternative fuels agreements are continuing through the Commercial Aviation Alternative Fuels Initiative, of which ATA is a founding member.
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How about using Southern California's hillside brush for feedstock? We are plauged with firestorms every year now, it seems, so removing some of the brush from the hillsides before the yearly fires could be a win-win situation.
This is not true. According to the RenTech page---their process uses coal to liquid, Fischer-Tropsch process.
Not only is coal to liquid not renewable----it contributes large amounts of added CO2 to the atmoshere in the coal processing. Not only that, add the environmental damage of strip mining the coal, and the damage to watersheds from the stripmines.
This press release is COMPLETELY false and misleading.
This not a "green" technology at all---it is completely "black" technology.
Fischer-Tropsch process can produce diesel fuels using nothing but biomass sources. There is no need to use coal at all.
This is just an attempt to sneak coal in under the table as a non-polluting technology-----when in truth, coal is the most polluting energy source there is.
If the airlines were serious about reducing pollution----they'd be far better off to convert their vehicles to compressed natural gas instead. Natural gas at least does not come from strip mines.
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