Air Canada Partners in Biojet Supply Chain Initiative to Introduce Sustainable Aviation Biofuel to a Canadian Airport

MONTREAL, April 5, 2016 /CNW Telbec/ - Air Canada today announced it 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.

"We are pleased to support this important initiative by facilitating the logistics involved in the introduction of biojet to an airport's shared fuel system," said Teresa Ehman, Director – Environmental Affairs at Air Canada. "In doing our part towards responsible growth and environmental sustainability, Air Canada has invested billions of dollars in fleet renewal to reduce our fuel consumption and meet our current emission reduction goals. Biojet holds the potential to be an important part of our strategy for achieving our longer-term industry goals of carbon neutral growth from 2020 and a 50 per cent reduction in emissions by 2050, relative to 2005 levels. The CBSCI project will contribute significantly to advancing a biojet supply chain in this country."

The CBSCI project is a first in Canada and is aimed at creating a sustainable Canadian supply chain of biojet using renewable feedstocks. Canada has abundant agricultural and forestry biomass resources, with globally recognized sustainable production and harvesting practices. 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.

CBSCI includes a strong research component with the participation of Queen's University, University of Toronto, and McGill University, who will be assisting in modeling feedstock availability, identifying and addressing barriers to biojet adoption in co-mingled fuel systems and implementing the IATA Sustainability Meta Standard.

About Canada's Biojet Supply Chain Initiative (CBSCI)

CBSCI is coordinated through BioFuelNet Canada's Aviation Task Force and managed by Waterfall Group, with primary funding from the Green Aviation Research and Development Network, a non-profit organization funded by the Business-Led Network of Centres of Excellence of the Government of Canada and the Canadian aerospace industry.

Participants in CBSCI include: Air Canada, ASCENT (US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Centre of Excellence for Alternative Jet Fuels & Environment @Washington State University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology), BioFuelNet, Boeing, Commercial Aviation Alternative Fuels Initiative (CAAFI), International Air Transport Association (IATA), McGill University, National Research Council, Queen's University, SkyNRG, Transport Canada, University of Toronto, Waterfall Group.

For more information, see http://gardn.org

About Air Canada:
Air Canada is Canada's largest domestic and international airline serving more than 200 airports on six continents.  Canada's flag carrier is among the 20 largest airlines in the world and in 2015 served more than 41 million customers.  Air Canada provides scheduled passenger service directly to 63 airports in Canada, 56 in the United States and 86 in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia, Australia, the Caribbean, Mexico, Central America and South America. Air Canada is a founding member of Star Alliance, the world's most comprehensive air transportation network serving 1,330 airports in 192 countries.  Air Canada is the only international network carrier in North America to receive a Four-Star ranking according to independent U.K. research firm Skytrax.  For more information, please visit: www.aircanada.com, follow @AirCanada on Twitter and join Air Canada on Facebook.

SOURCE Air Canada

Air Canada: Isabelle Arthur (Montréal), [email protected], 514 422-5788; Peter Fitzpatrick (Toronto), [email protected], 416 263-5576; Angela Mah (Vancouver), [email protected], 604 270-5741; Internet: aircanada.com; Waterfall Group: Fred J. Ghatala, [email protected], 604 947 0040