By Michael Sirak

MCGUIRE AFB, N.J.–On Monday, the 104th anniversary of the Wright Brothers’ first powered flight, the Air Force said it achieved another milestone by flying an aircraft for the first time ever from coast to coast using a synthetic fuel blend that the service intends to certify for use on its entire fleet by early next decade.

A C-17 Globemaster III transport aircraft took off from McChord AFB. Wash., with its four Pratt and Whitney [UTX] F117-PW-100 turbofan engines burning a mix of 50 percent traditional JP-8 aviation fuel and 50 percent Fischer-Tropsch Kerosene (FTK), a synthetic aviation fuel derived from natural gas under a process called the Fisher-Tropsch method that is named after the German chemists who invented it in the 1920s: Franz Fischer and Hans Tropsch. Hours later, the Boeing [BA]- built C-17 from McChord’s 7th Airlift Squadron touched down here and then, after a ceremony, circled over New York City before turning southward and flying to Andrews AFB. Md.

Air Force officials said the transcontinental flight was a symbolic step on the path towards clearing all of the service’s bombers, fighters, tankers, transports and information-gathering and command-and-control aircraft to use the FTK mix within the next four years or so.

“I have established the goal of having the entire fleet certified to fly on a synthetic fuel blend by about 2011,” Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne said during a meeting with reporters at McGuire minutes prior to the C-17’s arrival.

The use of FTK holds the promise of reducing U.S. dependence on foreign sources of energy, Wynne said. This is because the Fischer-Tropsch process can convert many types of carbon-based materials, such as coal, of which the United States has abundant supply, to synthetic liquid aviation fuel (Defense Daily, Dec. 22, 2006).

The desire, he said, is to make a new source of energy viable that can be supplied domestically and that is environmentally friendlier to produce than contemporary aviation fuel yet does not impede aircraft performance in any way.

The Air Force has already certified the B-52 bomber aircraft for the FTK blend (Defense Daily, Aug. 8). Completion of the certification process for the C-17 is anticipated around April 2008. Flights of the C-17 with FTK began in October.

Wynne said during the press conference the Air Force, the largest consumer of energy in the U.S. government, is taking a leadership role in testing and certifying the FTK. It is one of the service’s many activities to promote alternative and renewable fuels to chip away at overseas energy deendence.

“We’re working very closely with our Army and Navy colleagues to ensure that this fuel is capable of operating in all of our aircraft,” he said of the FTK mix. “This is especially important because JP-8 military jet fuel is commonly used in the battlefield by the Army and Marines tactical vehicles and generators, as well as our respective aircraft.”

While the Air Force wants to be a buyer of the alternative fuels, it has no interest in being a producer of them, Wynne said. But it is working to help foster the emergence of a domestic supplier base for the FTK by around 2012 from which it can beginning drawing.

“This really is the frontier of a new industry,” he said during the ceremony after the C-17 landed.

The next big step in the process as certification of aircraft continues is to secure congressional approval to enter into long-term contracts with U.S. suppliers of the synthetic fuel, Wynne said.

To date, the Air Force has acquired all of its FTK from foreign suppliers for the certification testing. But by 2016, Air Force officials say, the service hopes that half of the aviation fuel that it buys– roughly 400 million gallons–will be the FTK blend supplied by domestic producers.

Already the Air Force is exploring the idea of leasing space at Malmstrom AFB, Montana, to a private company to build a coal-to-synthetic aviation fuel conversion plant there.

Wynne said the idea fits in with the White House’s position to encourage locating energy facilities, such as oil refineries, on military bases. Malmstrom’s infrastructure has the fuel tanks and piping in place and the railroad connections, he said. Further, huge coal deposits lie relatively nearby.

“It would seem to me that that would be an interesting place to investigate to meet the president’s objective,” he said.

Wynne said data from tests to date show that engines run cleaner with less carbon emissions when burning the FTK blend. This causes less caking in the engine, which translates into less maintenance requirements and perhaps longer engine lives, he said.

The constraints are in the engine seals, so the Air Force is investigating new types of seals that would last longer.

Wynne said the Air Force chose to start off with the B-52 since the aircraft’s design allows the aircrew to isolate the fuel flow to each pair of its eight Pratt & Whitney TF33 engines. This allowed for the flexibility in early flight tests to feed the FTK blend to one nacelle of two engines while the remaining six engines ran on traditional JP-8 fuel.

Wynne said the C-17 certification is “a bridge” to the commercial airline world since the F117 engine is used on Boeing 757 passenger aircraft.

The Air Force is also currently conducting ground tests of the General Electric [GE] F101 two-stage supersonic engine that powers the B-1B bomber aircraft (Defense Daily, Dec. 3). Certifying this powerplant will pave the way for the Air Force’s fighter fleet that uses high-performance engines with afterburners, he said.

Wynne said the Air Force’s tanker aircraft likely will be the last portion of the fleet to get cleared to use the FTK fuel. Unlike the B-52, they can not isolate fuel for different purposes and must instead burn the same fuel in flight as they carry to transfer to receiver aircraft, he noted.

The Air Force anticipates spending about $176 million through FY ’13, the end date of the Department of Defense’s current multiyear spending plan, to certify the entire fleet, Paul Bollinger, special assistant to the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Installations, Environment and Logistics, told reporters onboard the C-17 on Monday.

Once the fleet is cleared to use the 50-50 blend in 2011, the Air Force intends to certify blends with higher percentages of FTK, he said.

By 2012, Air Force hopes that there will be at least two plants producing the FTK in the United States.

On Monday, the Air Force announced that it achieved another milestone on the alternative energy front with the completion of the largest solar photovoltaic system in North America at Nellis AFB, Nev. The solar energy system, which covers 140 acres, will generate more than 30 million kilowatt hours of clean electricity annually, supplying about one- quarter of the base’s total power, the service said. The service is considering similar setups at additional bases.

Among its other activities, Air Force officials say the service is exploring the viability of developing small-sized nuclear plants to power its bases. It is also researching biofuels.