Gassing up the C-17 cargo plane with a coal-based synthetic fuel could begin soon, according to an Air Force representative.
Using synthetic biology, the team altered the bacteria's cell mechanisms so that the sugar was converted to synthetic fuel molecules instead.
Choosing plants with no food value sidesteps one of the biggest criticisms of another synthetic fuel, corn ethanol, because critics say that corn should be used as food, not fuel.
In fact, the Air Force has already begun testing a program to certify coal-based synthetic fuels for the B-52 bomber, a process that may lead to synthetic fuel use in all of its planes.
But the shift towards synthetic fuel has provoked criticism, because when such fuel is made from coal and then burned in an aircraft engine, more greenhouse gases are emitted overall than would be produced if the aircraft simply burned conventional fuel derived from oil.
The ultra-clean, synthetic diesel fuel is made from animal fats, such as beef tallow, pork lard and chicken fat.
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Instead, out comes a synthetic gaseous fuel and a lump of shiny rock, not unlike volcanic glass, with toxins locked up inside in relative safety.
By 2016 the air force seeks to use a 50:50 blend of synthetic and ordinary jet fuel for half of its aviation requirements within America.
The remaining value can be attributed to oil and gas trading and energy products like natural gas, synthetic oil, bitumen and fuel oil.
Synthetic fertiliser production and fossil fuel burning are responsible for this.
Gasification of coal offers the potential to turn dirty burning hydrocarbons into cleaner burning liquid fuels, such as synthetic natural gas, jet fuel and gasoline, as well as hydrogen for fuel cell use, a developing field.
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In the 1970s and 1980s the federal government poured billions of dollars into the Synthetic Fuels Corporation to develop liquid and gas fuel from coal, and into the fast-breeder nuclear reactor.
The hybrid design which Mr Jubb has come up with uses a solid fuel called hydroxyl-terminated polybutadiene, a form of synthetic rubber used to make things like aircraft tyres.
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