Air Canada buys 'low carbon' jet fuel from B.C. refinery

Parkland's Burnaby refinery has announced that Air Canada has bought a batch of "low carbon aviation fuel" made from non-food grade canola and tallow.

Parkland said it has produced about 100,000 litres of the fuel using existing infrastructure, which will be blended into about 10 million litres of standard fuel.

While it depends on the flight distance, the plane used, and how heavy the cargo is, a short-haul flight burns about 2,500 litres of fuel, according to Parkland.

Parkland said it's the first company to produce low-carbon fuel in Canada.

"Currently, the Canadian airline industry is dependent on international imports of low carbon fuels, making Parkland's accomplishment a critical first step in creating domestic supply," said Air Canada president and CEO Michael Rousseau.

At a news conference Tuesday, Parkland senior vice-president Ferio Pugliese said the low-carbon fuel is more expensive than conventional jet fuels to produce and, therefore, requires a "long-term" plan from Canada to support sustained production.

He said the plan is to increase the amount of low-carbon fuel that's blended with standard fuel, noting that the carbon reduction is "not super intensive at this stage."

Commercial aviation giant Airbus has said that low-carbon jet fuel can reduce carbon dioxide emissions by about 80 per cent, but the ecosystem for the fuel is still "in its infancy" with just 600 million litres produced last year, making up 0.2 per cent of all aviation fuel for 2023. 

UBC researcher Jack Saddler said the 100,000 litres of aviation fuel produced by Parkland is a very small amount when compared to the amount of fuel used in transportation, but he adds, "you've got to start somewhere."

"If you're using something like used cooking oil, if the feedstock changes and you're using something like canola or soya, well, you've got to put the inputs for the tractor, the fertilizer," Saddler said, "but even then it's probably the carbon emissions have been reduced maybe by about 50 per cent."

Saddler said aviation is a hard sector to decarbonize. 

"I think eventually they'll have to download some of those additional costs onto the consumer."

"We need to do more to make low-carbon air travel a reality," Pugliese said. "We need a long-term Canadian solution for low-carbon, sustainable aviation fuel."

While the potential for emission reduction is massive, production in Canada is also significantly more expensive, Pugliese said. 

He notes that similar low-carbon fuels used in vehicles, buses and ferries have about one-eighth of the carbon content when compared to traditional fuels. 

Pugliese said other countries, such as the United States, incentivize the production and use of low-carbon jet fuel, creating the necessary ecosystem to support local industry.

"Currently, the Canadian aviation industry purchases low-carbon aviation [fuel] from other countries and imports it from across the globe into Canada. That makes little sense."

Parkland began trying to develop the fuel in 2017, and the entire batch of the first production run has already been bought by Air Canada.

Pugliese said the purchase of the fuel by Air Canada completes a value chain within the country that shows local development, production, sale and use of low-carbon jet fuel can be achieved to the benefit of everyone — but only if the support from government is there.

"Airlines need very practical solutions, and today, right here in B.C., Parkland has created a made-in-Canada solution to a global challenge," he said.

The comments echoed that of WestJet CEO Alexis von Hoensbroech, who in 2023 said the global push for decarbonizing commercial aviation by 2050 will cause spikes in airfares unless governments intervene.

Part of the challenge, von Hoensbroech said, is that alternative energy sources, such as electric or hydrogen for aircraft, remain a long way from reality, making the sector difficult to decarbonize.