Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936

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Fuel
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/fuel

Review article

An overview on performance characteristics of bio-jet fuels T

a b a,⁎ c a
Jie Yang , Zhong Xin , Quan (Sophia) He , Kenneth Corscadden , Haibo Niu
a
Department of Engineering, Faculty of Agriculture, Dalhousie University, Truro, NS B2N 5E3, Canada
b
School of Chemical Engineering, East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai 200237, China
c
Centre for Technology, Environment & Design, Lethbridge College, Lethbridge, AB T1K 1L6, Canada

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Bio-based aviation fuels are considered as a promising alternative for conventional aviation fuels due to their
Bio-jet fuels sustainability and environmental friendliness. This review evaluated bio-jet fuels’ performance based on their
Jet fuels physicochemical properties, including low-temperature fluidity, thermal oxidation stability, combustion prop-
Performance characteristics erty, fuel compatibility and volatility, and energy density. The objective is to understand the effects of the
Aromatic content
chemical compositions of bio-jet fuels on their performance characteristics. This is of particular importance in
Aviation fuels
that bio-jet fuels are generally derived from a broad spectrum of feedstock and thus have very different com-
position. In general, bio-jet fuels exhibit satisfactory characteristics in compliance with the American Society for
Testing and Materials D7566-18 standard. The aromatic content has a critical influence on the performance of
bio-jet fuels. Research efforts are needed to study the characteristics of recently certified bio-based blending
components such as synthesized iso-paraffins and alcohol-to-jet. Storage stability, a rarely reported property also
deserves further investigation.

1. Introduction
The global aviation industry is expected to continuously expand in
coming years due to the significant role of air transport in the modern
world. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) reported that
nearly 3.8 billion passengers and 53.9 million metric tons of goods
valued at nearly $5.5 trillion were transported in 2016. According to
the IATA annual report 2017, commercial aviation provided 67.7 mil-
lion jobs and contributed $3.0 trillion in economic activities in 2016. It
is estimated that commercial aviation will continuously expand and
create 90 million jobs and nearly $6 trillion in annual economic ac-
tivities by 2034 (as compared to $3 trillion in 2016). This dramatic
growth in air traffic requires large amount of aviation fuels (jet fuels),
however, the extensive use of conventional oils over recent decades has
resulted in a remarkable decline in petroleum reserves.
The large consumption of jet fuel also generates considerable
greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, which account for around 2% global
CO2 emissions every year. With a growing awareness of GHG emissions
and climate change, the aviation industry aims to achieve a 50% re-
duction in CO2 emission by 2050 as compared to 2005’s level. These
combined factors are driving researchers and airline companies to de-
velop renewable and environmental innocuous jet fuel alternatives [1].
Bio-based aviation fuels (bio-jet fuels) have recently attracted great
interest as alternatives for conventional jet fuels. They have become the
focus for aircraft and engine manufacturers, oil companies, govern-
ments and researchers alike. IATA has identified bio-jet fuel as the most
promising strategy to reduce CO2 emissions from the aviation sector in
the foreseeable future.
ASTM D7566-18 has defined five types of synthesized paraffinic
kerosene (SPK) as blending components for conventional jet fuel (in
certain volume percentage) to make up bio-jet fuels. The general pro-
duction pathways of certified SPKs are presented in Table 1. Up to
50 vol.% FT-SPK is permitted to be blended with conventional jet fuel
as specified in ASTM D7566. Hydroprocessed esters and fatty acids
(HEFA) was proved in 2011 with up to a blending ratio of 50: 50 vol
Due to the important role of aromatic content in aviation fuel, FT-SPK
plus Aromatics (FT-SPK/A) was added into the ASTM D7566 standard
in 2015. The aromatics content in FT-SPK/A is intentionally increased
to a maximum of 20 wt%. Although FT-SPK/A has a relatively high
aromatic content, it is still not satisfactory for aviation turbine engines
unless being blended with conventional jet fuel (up to 50 vol.%). In
2015, synthesized iso-paraffins (SIP) was certified in ASTM D7566 as
well, even though only up to 10 vol.% SIP was allowed to be blended
with conventional jet fuel. Alcohol-to-jet (ATJ) aims to use C2-C5 al-
cohols for the production of ATJ-SPK, and iso-butanol (C4) was ap-
proved in 2016 while ethanol (C2) was certified in 2018. Up to 50 vol.%

⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: quan.he@dal.ca (Q.S. He).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fuel.2018.10.079
Received 30 August 2018; Received in revised form 4 October 2018; Accepted 11 October 2018
Available online 16 October 2018
0016-2361/ © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
J. Yang et al.
Table 1
The general production pathways of synthesized paraffinic kerosene (SPK).
Pathway SPK Descriptions
Gas-to-jet FT-SPK Gasification to obtain Syn-gas (CO + H2); Fisher-Tropsch (FT) to synthesize paraffins and olefins, followed by hydroprocessing
FT-SPK/A In addition to the FT-SPK, the aromatic content is intentionally increased by adding alkylated & bio-based aromatics
Oil-to-jet HEFA-SPK Deoxygenation of mono-, di-, and triglycerides, free fatty acids and fatty acid esters, followed by hydroprocessing
Sugar-to-jet SIP-SPK Hydrolysis to obtain fermentable sugars; fermentation of sugars for farnesene production, followed by hydroprocessing and fractionation
Alcohol-to-jet ATJ-SPK Hydrolysis to obtain fermentable sugars; fermentation of sugars for iso-butanol and ethanol production, followed by dehydration, oligomerization,
hydrogenation and fractionation
Table 2
Currently available reviews on bio-jet fuels with different focuses.
Year Produciton routes Techno-economic and environmental assessments
2018 1 3
2017 7 2
2016 3 3
≤2015 4 4
Total 15 12
blending of ATJ-SPK is permitted.
To date, there are some 40 review papers on bio-jet fuels which can
generally be classified into five categories with emphasis on production
routes, techno-economic and environmental analysis, combustion
characteristics, catalytic treatment and social science perspective re-
spectively as shown in Table 2. There are obviously more reviews on
bio-jet fuels’ production routes and techno-economic and environ-
mental analysis than the other three subjects. Gutiérrez-Antonio et al.
[2] have thoroughly reviewed the advances on bio-jet fuels production
from scientific (publications) respective and technical (patents) re-
spective. State-of-the-art development on the production of microbial
alkane/hydrocarbon as bio-jet fuel was recently reviewed by Jimé-
nez‐Díaz et al. [3]. The production routes of drop-in bio-jet fuels were
reviewed by Karatzos et al. [4], and they concluded that the bio-jet
fuels from oil-based feedstock will be predominantly produced in the
near term (1–5 years), due to the relative simplicity and maturity of this
production pathway.
In terms of techno-economic and environmental assessements on
bio-jet fuels, Deane and Pye [5] most recently provided a strategic re-
view of challenges and opportunities for the Europe’s targets on bio-jet
fuels. They stated that although ground transportation in the EU has
benefited from the implementation of biodiesel and bioethanol, high
bio-jet fuel cost, investor uncertainty and poor policy awareness at EU
Member State level contributed to the nascent state of bio-jet fuels in
Europe; A clear and stable policy landscape and non-policy measures
are required to overcome these challenges. The reviews [6,7] are fo-
cusing on combustion properties of bio-jet fuels. Leitner et al. [8]
adopted an integrative view of turbine engine combustion and bio-jet
fuels synthesis, which allowed them to evaluate the combustion prop-
erties, energy efficiency and bio-jet fuels synthesis systematically.
An overview of the catalyst effect on hydroprocessing of oil-based
feedstock for bio-jet fuels production was contributed by Mohammad
et al. [9] and Galadima and Muraza [10]. Li et al. [11] also reviewed
the fundemental catalytic routes for energy-intensive fuels including
bio-jet fuels and chemicals production from biomass. Advances in na-
nocatalyst design for high density biofuels production was discussed in
details by Zuliani et al. [12]. Pashaei et al. [13] recently examinated the
feasibility of bio-jet fuels production in Brazil from social science per-
spective, screening the potential social and governance issues. They
suggested that governance issues are certainly regarded as important
for sustainability of the sugarcane bio-jet fuels supply chain in Brazil,
and future research should focus on quantitative assessment of human
health and safety, labor rights and working conditions.
Although many review efforts on bio-jet fuels have been made as
mentioned above, to the authors knowledge, no review article focusing
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Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936
Combustion characteristics Catalytic treatment Social science perspective Total
0 2 0 6
1 0 2 12
1 1 0 8
1 2 3 14
3 5 5 40
on the physicochemical properties of bio-jet fuels has been reported yet.
Therefore, this work aims to provide a thorough review on the physi-
cochemical properties of bio-jet fuels, as well as an insightful under-
standing on the relationship between the chemical compositions and
physicochemical properties of bio-jet fuels. This review would add new
contribution to the existing body of knowledge for the bio-jet fuel field,
and would be beneficial when evaluating the overall feasibility of bio-
jet fuels production.
The present review is organized as follows. First, the basics of
conventional jet fuels and bio-jet fuels are provided in Section 2 and
Section 3 respectively, followed by the chemical composition of bio-jet
fuels, which is presented in Section 4. Then, the detailed physico-
chemical properties of bio-jet fuels are evaluated in Section 5, including
fluidity at low temperature, thermal oxidation stability, combustion
property, compatibility with current aviation fueling system, fuel vo-
latility, and fuel metering and aircraft range. Existing challenges and
future outlooks for bio-jet fuels are discussed in Section 6 and the
conclusions are presented in Section 7.
2. Basics on conventional jet fuels
Fuel price is one of the largest operation costs (about 30%) in the
aviation industry because only high-quality paraffinic fuels can be
adopted for aviation purposes [14,15]. Aviation fuels is a clear to straw-
colored fuel and commonly applied for compression ignition engines.
Conventional aviation turbine fuel is a mixture of hundreds of different
hydrocarbons (namely kerosene), which is typically extracted from
conventional crude oil (middle distillates fraction). Aviation turbine
fuel accounts for around 10% of the crude oil cut, with the majority of
the remainder being gasoline and diesel. The carbon range of jet fuel
hydrocarbons is typically between gasoline and diesel fuel. Gasoline is
lighter and more volatile than jet fuel and diesel is relatively heavier
and more prone to waxing at low temperature. The comparison of
several important properties of these three fossil liquid fuels are listed
in Table 3.
Commercial aircraft typically use Jet A-1 as a fuel source, which has
a carbon number distribution between 8 and 16. The range of jet fuel
carbon number is strictly controlled during fuel refinery processes in
order to obtain desirable fuel properties. The detailed chemical com-
position and corresponding structures of components in Jet A-1 are
presented in supplementary materials Table S1. It shows that Jet A-1 is
mainly composed of n-paraffins, branched iso-alkanes (iso-paraffins),
cyclic alkanes (naphthenes) and aromatics etc. Jet propellant (JP) fuels
have similar chemical composition with Jet A-1. JP1-JP10 are generally
used for military aircraft while specific additives might be added to JP
J. Yang et al. Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936

Table 3 whereas SIP is specified differently due to it unique chemical compo-

The general comparison of petroleum gasoline, aviation fuel and diesel fuel
properties.
Fuel properties Gasoline Aviation fuel Diesel
Density at 15 °C (g/ 0.72–0.78 0.75–0.84 0.82–0.85
cm3)
Kinematic viscosity 0.37–0.44 (at max. 8 (at 2.00–4.50 (at
(mm2/s) 20 °C) −20 °C) 40 °C)
Lower heating value 43.4 43.0 43.4
(MJ/kg)
Flash point (°C) −43 min. 38 min. 55
Boiling point (°C) max. 210 (100% max. 300 (100% max.360 (95%
recov.) recov.) recov.)
Cloud point (°C) −57 – −15 to 5
Pour point (°C) – – −35 to −15
Freezing point (°C) – min. −47 (Jet A- – laboratively exploring more sustainable and economically-viable bio-jet
1)
fuels to achieve the special property requirements of military aircraft
engines [16–18].
3. Basics on bio-jet fuels
All jet (aviation) fuels have to meet strict standard specifications
before they can be approved for any commercial activities. ASTM
D1655 governed by the American Society for Testing and Materials in
USA and DEF STAN 91-91 generated by the British Ministry of Defence
(MOD) in the UK are the two most commonly used standards for jet
fuels. Bio-jet fuels (or aviation renewable fuels) are referred as a mix-
ture of conventional aviation fuels and bio-based synthesized hydro-
carbons rather than 100% bio-based compounds. Bio-jet fuels must be
certified as being equivalent to ASTM D1655 specifications in order to
achieve a desirable compatibility with the existing aircraft fleet. Sasol,
South Africa is the first company that requested synthesized hydro-
carbons (produced by FT process from biomass) to be certified as a
blending component for fossil jet fuels. Thus, ASTM and British MOD
have made numerous efforts to comprehensively evaluate the feasibility
of using bio-based synthetic hydrocarbon as a blending component for
conventional aviation turbines. This process has to follow a very rig-
orous path as outlined in ASTM D4054 (the Standard Practice for
Qualification and Approval of New Aviation Turbine Fuels and Fuel
Additives). ASTM D4054 was firstly issued in 2009 to provide a fra-
mework for the approval process of new bio-jet fuels, which was
composed of test programs, internal reviews, and the specification
change. As for the test programs, some “fit-for-purpose” properties that
are not specified in ASTM D1655 but described in “Handbook of Aviation
Fuel Properties”, such as thermal coefficient of expansion, surface ten-
sion, thermal conductivity, flammability limits versus altitude etc, were
also assessed to ensure acceptable engine and fuel performance
throughout all aircraft operation environments. The test results were
then reviewed by the original equipment manufacturer (OEM) and U.S.
Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). Even if the test results are sa-
tisfactory and the specification change is proposed, the proposed
change must be reviewed and balloted; and this process might go
through several iterations before a change can be finally made to the
standard specification. Detailed information on the certification process
of bio-jet fuels can be found in the previous review works [7,19,20].
A new standard ASTM D7566 (Standard Specification for Aviation
Turbine Fuel Containing Synthesized Hydrocarbons) was co-ordinated
by the US-based ASTM and the UK DEF STAN organization in 2009 [7].
As more investigations on alternative jet fuels proceeded, other types of
synthesized hydrocarbons, including HEFA-SPK (2011), SIP-SPK
(2015), FT-SPK/A (2015) and ATJ-SPK (2018) were also certified as the
blending components for conventional aviation fuels as illustrated in
ASTM D7566-18 and shown in Table S2. It is noticed that FT-SPK,
HEFA, FT-SPK/A and ATJ have comparable standard specifications,
sition (a minimum of 97 wt% of farnesane). Although some specifica-
tions are not required for SPKs, such as kinematic viscosity at −20 °C,
smoking point and net heat of combustion (except SIP), the blended
fuels must meet these standard specifications before being implemented
in aviation activities. It is also notable that along with the development
of bio-jet fuels, the global aviation fuel supply chain becomes more
complex and diverse. To achieve the consistency at an international
level, a checklist that combines the most stringent requirements from
ASTM and DEF STAN jet fuel specifications has been proposed, known
as Aviation Fuel Quality Requirements for Jointly Operated Systems
(AFQRJOS) checklist.
In addition to the legislative framework and the certified standards
for bio-jet fuels, many researchers and industrial practitioners are col-
fuels production routes and applying bio-jet fuels in actual aviation
activities. UOP Honeywell, SkyNRG and Sasol are currently the world-
leading company on bio-jet fuels production. A number of commercial
flight tests for bio-jet fuels have been carried out as well, such as Hainan
Airline tested the HEFA from waste cooking oil in the Boeing 747 air-
craft in 2015. As these topics are beyond the scope of this review, they
are therefore no included in this work. Detailed information and dis-
cussion on production routes, ongoing industrial-scale projects and
commercial flight testes can be found in the lietrature [2,7,21].
A few recent studies thoroughly investigated the techno-economic
and environmental perspective of bio-jet fuels development. For in-
stance, Olcay et al. [22] carried out a comprehensive study on the
techno-economic and environmental evaluation of producing chemicals
and ‘drop-in’ bio-jet fuels via aqueous phase processing (APP). They
conducted detailed process simulations for seven biorefinery models,
which accounted different biomass pre-treatment methods, process
yields, product slates, and hydrogen sources etc. The simulated results
were then used to conduct well-to-wake lifecycle analysis for green-
house gas (GHG) emissions, and to calculate the minimum selling price
(MSP) along with the historical commodity price data from January
2010 to December 2015. Their results revealed that the variation in the
estimated GHG emissions was primarily driven by the choice of hy-
drogen source, whereas the relative production volumes of chemicals to
fuels was the most influential factor for the MSP. The latter is a con-
sequence of the fact that APP chemicals considered here (furfural, 5-
hydroxymethylfurfural, levulinic acid and gamma-valerolactone) have
higher economic values than the liquid fuels, and their production is
less carbon intensive as well. Similarly, the co-production of bio-jet
fuels with value-added biochemicals in a biorefinery context was
proven to be economically feasible by Alves et al. [23], through car-
rying out techno-economical assessments on bio-jet fuels supply chain
in Brazil. HEFA and ethanol-to-jet fuels were determined to be the two
most desirable production routes, and succinic acid and lactic acid
presented the highest economic profitability.
As for the assessment on bio-jet fuels from social science perspec-
tive, Filimonau et al. [24] explored public attitudes on the use of bio-jet
fuels in an emerging tourist market (Poland). It was found that public
understanding on the bio-jet fuels (including its safety issues) is limited
and needs to be reinforced through educational and public awareness-
raising campaigns. It is worthwhile to mention that the conclusions of
techno-economic, environmental and social assessments on bio-jet fuels
are strongly dependent on the inherent set of assumptions made in
these studies since the biorefinery platforms for bio-jet fuels are still at
such an early stage.
4. The chemical compositions of bio-jet fuels
As previously noted, introducing a new jet fuel blending component
in aeronautics is a great challenge and may take 5–10 years to go
through an approval process. This is because aircraft fuel needs to meet
stricter and more severe constraints compared to other transportation

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J. Yang et al. Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936

fuels [25,26]. The performance characteristics of bio-jet fuels in turbine treatments.

engines are closely related to their chemical composition. In general,
synthesized hydrocarbons have less complicated chemical composition
than conventional jet fuels that comprise hundred kinds of hydro-
carbons. FT-SPK, HEFA and ATJ-SPK are made up by n-, iso- and cyclo-
paraffins, and SIP mainly consists of iso-paraffins (a minimum of 97 wt
% of farnesane). FT-SPK, HEFA, ATJ-SPK and SIP contains low or/and
negligible amount of aromatics, but FT-SPK/A comprises up to 20 wt%
of alkylated aromatics.
4.1. Ft-spk
Fisher-Tropsch (FT) technology has been extensively studied to
convert syngas (CO + H2) into desirable liquid fuels [27–29]. FT-SPK
should contain a high percent of n- and iso-paraffins and a maximum of
15 wt% cyclo-paraffins, and be almost free of sulfur and aromatic
content [30,31]. The hydrocarbon distributions of synthetic jet fuel via
FT technology could vary with different original feedstocks (such as
natural gas, coal and biomass) and hydroprocessing routes [32–34].
Corporan et al. [34] reported that FT-SPK was primarily composed of
paraffinic compounds at varying concentrations, along with negligible
amounts of hetero-atom species and aromatics. Westhuizen et al. [35]
comprehensively analyzed and compared the chemical compositions of
FT-SPK with fossil jet fuel by two-dimensional gas chromatography.
They stated that the major chemical compositions of FT-SPK and con-
ventional jet fuel were very similar with the exception of alkyl benzene
content (2.73 wt% and 14.05 wt% respectively). The chemical compo-
sitions of FT-SPK is presented in Table 4 and hydrocarbon distributions
is provided Table S3.
4.2. Hefa
After the approval of FT-SPK as a blending component up to 50% in
volume for conventional aviation fuel in 2009, HEFA was certified as
another blending component for fossil jet fuel on ASTM D7566 in 2011.
The chemical composition and carbon range of HEFA are generally si-
milar to FT-SPK as illustrated in Tables 4 and S3, indicating comparable
physicochemical properties between FT-SPK and HEFA.
HEFA, typically named as “hydroprocessed renewable jet” (HRJ),
bio-SPK or “green jet”, is an bio-jet fuel produced from vegetable oils
and animal fats via hydroprocessing technologies, such as hydro-
deoxygenation (HDO), hydrodecarboxylation and hydroisomerization
[36–38]. Various feedstock oils could be used for HEFA production,
including conventional rapeseed oil in European countries and soybean
and canola oils in North America, as well as non-conventional camelina
oil, jatropha oil, waste cooking oil and algae oil [39–42]. These non-
conventional oils usually contain relatively high content of free fatty
acids (FFA) that can be converted into HEFA via hydroprocessing
Vegetable oils chemically consist of triglycerides that have long
carbon chain length (C14–C22) [43,44], which make them undesirable
to be directly used as aviation turbine fuels after HDO. Thus, hydro-
isomerization or hydrocracking is needed to reduce the long carbon
chain into the desirable carbon range for bio-jet fuel [37,45]. Wang
et al. [46] designed a four-step conversion route to obtain bio-jet fuel
from plant oil, including enzymatic transesterification to obtain fatty
acid methyl esters (FAME), partial hydrogenation to obtain olefin acid
methyl esters, olefin cross-metathesis to generate new CeC bond and
subsequently obtain 1-decene (α-olefin, C10) and 1-decenoic acid me-
thyl ester (C11), and eventually, catalytic hydrodeoxygenation to obtain
bio-jet fuel (C10 saturated hydrocarbons).
Additionally, Wilson et al. [20] proposed that FAME/biodiesel
(oxygenated-containing compounds) was considered as a contaminant
component in HEFA, which should be limited to be less than 5 ppm in
ASTM D7566; therefore, FAME should not be considered as a blending
component for conventional jet fuels. However, some studies [47–51]
stated that the distillate of biodiesel could be directly used as a blending
component for fossil jet fuels. For instance, Oliveira et al. [51] eval-
uated the production of esters-enriched bio-jet fuel (C8–C16) from dis-
tillation of babassu FAME at a temperature range of 100–200 °C. A
temperature of 140 °C was determined to be favorable, and up to 6 wt%
of obtained esters-enriched bio-jet fuel can be blended with fossil ker-
osene, giving satisfactory fuel performance.
4.3. Ft-spk/a
FT SPK/A has been determined to contain less than 20 wt% of
aromatics. The standard specifications of FT-SPK/A are similar to that
of FT-SPK and HEFA, with an exception in terms of aromatics content as
well as a slightly different requirement in density as presented in Table
S2.
The importance of adding a suitable amount of aromatics into n-
paraffins has been identified by researchers via detailed kerosene ki-
netic modeling [52,53]. A surrogate of 89 mol% n-decane and 11 mol%
alkyl-substituted aromatics captured the major characteristics of kero-
sene flame [53]. Maurice et al. [54] suggested that a reasonable amount
of aromatic components was needed in a two-component surrogate of
jet fuel in order to properly predict its molecular growth and/or soot
behavior. Bi et al. [55] produced C8–C15 aromatic biofuel (ABF)
through catalytic depolymerisation of lignin followed by alkylation of
aromatics; C8–C15 cyclic alkane biofuel (CABF) was also generated by
hydrogenation of ABF. Several critical properties of pure ABF and CABF
were characterized, and both of them exhibited satisfactory freezing
point, kinematic viscosity and net heat of combustion. Hence, ABF and
CABF produced in the study showed great potential for FT-SPK/A
production.

Table 4
Chemical compositions (wt.%) of FT-SPK and HEFA.
Westhuizen et al. [35] Timko et al. [31] Corporan et al. [34]

FSJF Merox FT fuel Shell FT Sasol FT Rentech FT R-8 HEFA Tallow HEFA Camelina HEFA

n-paraffins 2.71 19.69 > 99 > 99 87 92 92 98 90

iso-paraffins 42.77 29.94 – – – – – – –
monocylic paraffins 13.84 20.34 3 <1 12 7 8 2 10
bicylic paraffins 20.39 6.73 <1 – – – – – –
polycyclic paraffins 8.68 0.53 <1 – – – – – –
alkyl benzenes 2.73 14.05 < 0.5 < 0.3 0.4 1.3 < 0.3 < 0.3 < 0.3
cyclic alkylbenzenes 8.48 5.01 < 0.5 – – – – – –
naphthalenes 0.35 3.66 < 0.5 < 0.3 < 0.3 < 0.3 < 0.3 < 0.3 < 0.3
indans and tetralins – – < 0.5 < 0.3 < 0.3 < 0.3 < 0.3 < 0.3 < 0.3
total 99.95 99.95 – 100 100 100 100 100 100

Notes: FSJF = fully synthesized jet fuel; Merox = kerosene fuel derived from crude oil; Shell, Sasol and Rentech indicates the company name; R-8 is a HEFA product
from Syntroleum Corporation.

919
J. Yang et al.
Fig. 1. The performance characteristics of bio-jet fuels with corresponding
properties.
4.4. Sip
Synthesized iso-paraffins (SIP) from hydroprocessing of biomass
fermentation product (farnesene) was certified as one of blending
components (up to 10% by volume) for fossil jet fuel in 2015.
Farnesene, a branched alkene with a chemical formula of C15H24, is
typically derived from lignocellulosic and sugarcane biomass via fer-
mentation in the presence of biocatalysts or microorganisms [56,57].
Similar to HEFA, obtained farnesene need to be further hydrogenated to
break down the double bonds in the carbon chains and obtain desirable
iso-paraffins [58]. The standard specifications of SIP are largely dif-
ferent from that of FT SPK, HEFA and FT SPK/A as illustrated in Table
S2. This is mainly due to its unique chemical composition and carbon
chain (a minimum of 97 wt% farnesane that comprises C15 hydrocarbon
chain).
Only up to 10 vol.% of SIP fuel is allowed to be blended with fossil
jet fuels, and this is because its relatively long carbon chains result in
high viscosity and poor combustion performance in aviation turbine
engines [59,60]. Although only up to 10 vol.% of SIP was approved as a
blending component for fossil jet fuels as compared to 50 vol.% for FT
SPK, HEFA and FT SPK/A, this additional new source of synthesized
hydrocarbon can relieve the critical issue of biomass availability and
economic viability of bio-jet fuel production [61]. Successful en-
gineering of Saccharomyces cerevisiae for producing farnesene has been
achieved [62,63]. Extracting hydrocarbons from sugar seems to be a
relatively low-cost route for bio-jet fuel production compared to the FT-
SPK process that typically requires high investment costs [64–66].
4.5. Atj-spk
ATJ-SPK was recently certified as a blending component (up to
50 vol%) for conventional jet fuels. Although now only the use of iso-
butanol and ethanol for ATJ-SPK production are allowed, using all
C2–C5 alcohols for ATJ-SPK production is an ultimate goal. ATJ-SPK
starting from alcohols is usually processed through dehydration, oli-
gomerization, hydrogenation and fractionation, unfortunately, the
chemical compositions of ATJ-SPK are rarely available.
Luning Prak et al. [67] reported that ATJ-SPK mainly consisted of
two branched alkanes (2,2,4,4,6,8,8-heptamethylnonane, C16H34 and
2,2,4,6,6-pentamethylheptane, C12H26), and a small quantity of other
branched alkanes that are isomers of these two alkanes. This ATJ-SPK
920
Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936
fuel was produced by GEVO company using proprietary microorgan-
isms to produce first iso-butanol, followed by the catalytic dehydration
of it to obtain alkene monomers. These alkene monomers were then
oligomerized to generate compounds with desirable carbon chain
length, followed by the hydrogenation to eliminate any remaining
double bonds.
Scheuermann et al. [68] proposed a comparable chemical compo-
sition of ATJ-SPK with that of Luning Prak et al. [67], in which mainly
consisted of C12H26 and C16H34 branched alkanes. Interestingly, they
also reported an ATJ-SPK/A product that contained 15.8 wt% of aro-
matics. This ATJ-SPK/A product was obtained by incorporating an
additional aromatization step upon the ATJ-SPK production processes.
5. Performance characteristics of bio-jet fuels
In order to ensure fuel safety, reliability, and compatibility with
existing airframe components and aero-engines, it is essential to eval-
uate the performance characteristics of bio-jet fuels and compare them
with specified standards (ASTM D7566-18). The performance char-
acteristics of aviation biofuels are critically important when assessing
the feasibility of ‘drop-in’ alternative jet fuels. With an aim to thor-
oughly evaluate the performance characteristics of bio-jet fuels, as well
as to gain an insightful understanding on the relationship between the
chemical composition and physicochemical properties of bio-jet fuels,
herein, the performance characteristics of bio-jet fuels were categorized
into low-temperature fluidity, thermal oxidation stability, combustion
property, fuel compatibility with current aviation system, fuel volati-
lity, and fuel metering and aircraft range. Each of these performance
characteristics was evaluated based on their corresponding properties
as shown in Fig. 1.**Fig. 2
5.1. Low-temperature fluidity
Low-temperature fluidity is one of most important characteristics
for bio-jet fuels. The low-temperature fluidity of bio-jet fuel can be
characterized by freezing point and kinematic viscosity. Since the
temperature of an aircraft fuel tank is extremely low at high altitudes,
the freezing point and kinematic viscosity of bio-jet fuel must be suf-
ficiently low to ensure proper fuel fluidity in turbine engine system.
5.1.1. Freezing point
Freezing point is a key representative for the low-temperature
properties of bio-jet fuels. A maximum of −40 °C was specified for FT-
SPK, HEFA, FT-SPK/A and ATJ-SPK and a maximum of −60 °C for SIP.
These specified freezing points for bio-jet fuels are much lower than the
cloud point (−15 to 5 °C) and pour point (−35 to −15 °C) that are
typically used for assessing diesel/biodiesel fluidity. The reported
freezing points from relevant studies varied significantly as presented in
Table 5.
There are three main factors that can significantly influence the
freezing point of bio-jet fuel, including the iso-paraffins content, the
alkylated aromatics content and the carbon chain length of bio-paraf-
fins. As for the effect of iso-paraffin content, Corporan et al. [34] de-
monstrated that Sasol FT-SPK containing a large proportion of branched
paraffins had an extremely low freezing point (< −77 °C). SIP fuel that
mainly consisted of branched alkanes (farnesane) had a freezing point
of −90 °C [69]. Although the freezing point for coconut HEFA-1 and
HEFA-2 were both higher than −40 °C, HEFA-2 (−18.5 °C) that went
through an isomerization process exhibited a lower freezing point than
HEFA-1 (9.5 °C, without isomerization) [15]. A low freezing point
(-80 °C) was reported for the branched cyclohexane fuel by Han et al.
[70] as well, which was catalytically synthesized by using aromatic
oxygenates and furfural alcohols via alkylation and subsequent HDO.
Nie et al. [71] developed a novel H2SO4 one-pot synthesis route for
directly producing branched decalins from monocyclic alkanes and al-
cohols at room temperature. The produced branched decalin fuel had a
J. Yang et al.
Fig. 2. Evaluation of thermal stability for bio-jet fuel (HEFA) and its blend fuels (up to 25 vol.% of aromatics): (a) tube deposit rating, (b) pressure drop (Adapted
from ref. Amara et al. [94], with permission from Elsevier).
freezing point of < −51 °C and a high heating value of ∼42 MJ/kg,
which exhibited promising potential as a jet fuel blending component
due to these favorable properties. Cataluña et al. [72] used iso-amyl
alcohol (an industrial residue obtained from the distillation of su-
garcane ethanol) and C5 hydrocarbon cut from thermal cracking of
naphtha unit to produce highly-branched di-amyl ether (DAE) in an
adiabatic reactor. The produced DAE had a low freezing point
(−92 °C), and blending DAE with fossil jet fuel (QAV-1) in different
ratio all resulted in satisfactory freezing points. A low freezing point of
−72 °C was reported for a potential bio-jet fuel as well, which was
derived from branched geranyl-acetone (C13H22O) [73].
In terms of the effect of alkylated aromatics content on the freezing
point of bio-jet fuels, Hong et al. [15] illustrated that the addition of
propylbenzene decreased HEFA’s freezing point, and the extent of
freezing point decline was proportional to the volume of added proyl-
benzene. Li et al. [74] used different raw materials including soybean
oil, rubber seed oil, waste cooking oil and acidified oil to produce bio-
jet fuel. These raw materials were pyrolyzed/cracked with 5 wt% base
catalyst at 350–450 °C (under atmospheric pressure) to obtain large
quantities (60–77%) of aviation fuel fraction (linear C8–C15 hydro-
carbons). This obtained pyrolytic product had a freezing point of
−37 °C, which was higher than the specification for HEFA (a maximum
of −40 °C). To overcome the limitation of high freezing point for this
pyrolytic product (linear hydrocarbons), they then used HZSM-5 cata-
lyst to partially transform linear hydrocarbons into alkylated aromatics
at 350 °C for 6 h. The final mixture of linear hydrocarbons (43.2 wt%),
alkylated aromatics (6.3 wt%) and cycloalkanes (28.1 wt%) exhibited a
low freezing point of -47 °C.
The carbon chain length of bio-paraffins also plays a crucial role for
the freezing point of bio-jet fuels. Robota et al. [45] stated that the
carbon chain length had the most significant impact on the freezing
921
Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936
point of synthesized jet fuels; proper hydrocracking of hydrogenated
algae oil was necessary to shorten the product carbon chain length. An
bio-jet fuel surrogate containing high limonane (C10) content had a
much lower freezing point than that of C15 farnesane (−97 °C vs.
−40 °C) [69,75]. A few attempts have been made to generate bioker-
osenes from (catalytic) distillation of triglyceride-based oil/resulting
biodiesel, unfortunately, the obtained biokerosenes commonly had
undesirable freezing points. For instance, Llamas et al. [50] reported a
freezing point of −10 °C and −15 °C for coconut biokerosene and palm
kernel biokerosene respectively. These high freezing points were likely
due to the long carbon chain length without proper hydrocracking.
Blending the palm kernel biokerosene (20 vol.%) with Jet A-1 led to a
freezing point of −41.5 °C [50], which was still higher than the ASTM
D7566-18 specification for blended aviation fuel (a maximum of
−47 °C for blending with Jet A-1). Similar observations were reported
by ElGalad et al. [76], that the freezing point of blended fuel (distillate
of palm biodiesel – Jet A-1) was not satisfactory.
In conclusion, the freezing point of bio-jet fuels are strongly asso-
ciated with the content of iso-paraffins, alkylated aromatics, and the
carbon chain length of bio-paraffins. High iso-paraffins and alkylated
aromatics content favored the low freezing point. Bio-jet fuel con-
taining short carbon chain exhibited low freezing point, and proper
hydrocracking is necessary to shorten biokerosene products from dis-
tilling triglyceride-based oil/resulting biodiesel.
5.1.2. Kinematic viscosity at −20 °C
The kinematic viscosity at −20 °C is another parameter that is
commonly used to characterize the low temperature fluidity of aviation
fuel. Although the kinematic viscosity limit is not specified for the
synthesized hydrocarbon fuels in ASTM D7566, the viscosity of the
blended jet fuel must be less than 8 mm2/s at −20 °C. Highly viscous
J. Yang et al. Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936

Table 5
Freezing point and kinematic viscosity of bio-jet fuels.
Fuel Freezing point (°C) Kinematic Viscosity (mm2/s) Ref.

Shell FT SPK −55 2.6 at −20 °C Corporan et al. [34]

Sasol FT SPK < −77 3.8 at −20 °C
Rentech FT SPK −50 5.1 at −20 °C
Tallow HEFA −62 5.3 at −20 °C
Camelina HEFA < −77 3.3 at −20 °C
SIP (AMJ-300)A −97.65 3.818 at −20 °C Renninger et al. [70]
SIP (UQI-1)A −40.36 7.714 at −20 °C Brennan et al. [76]
Farnesane −90 14.28 at −20 °C Chuck and Donnelly [77]
20 vol% Farnesene/Jet A-1 – 5.66 at −20 °C
50 vol% Farnesene/Jet A-1 – 8.37 at −20 °C
Coconut HEFA-1B 9.5 6.458 at −20 °C Hong et al. [15]
Coconut HEFA-2B −18.5 6.940 at −20 °C
Branched cyclohexane fuel −80 34.4 at −60 °C Han et al. [70]
Branched decalin fuel < −51 22 at −40 °C Nie et al. [71]
di-amyl ether (DAE)C −92 3.05 at −10 °C; Cataluña et al. [72]
1.50 at 40 °C
10% DAE/QAV-1C −57 1.59 at 40 °C
20% DAE/QAV-1 −62 1.58 at 40 °C
30% DAE/QAV-1 −68 1.57 at 40 °C
Geranyl acetone derived fuelD −72 – Ju et al. [73]
Distillate of triglyceride-based oil −37 1.82 at 20 °C Li et al. [74]
Aromatized-hydrogenated fuel −48 2.11 at 20 °C
Coconut biokerosene (CBK)E −10 8.26 at −20 °C Llamas et al. [50]
Palm kernel biokerosene (PBK)E −15.3 7.16 at −20 °C
20 vol% PBK/Jet A-1 −41.5 4.06 at −20 °C
SIP fuel < −80 3.008 at −20 °C Scheuermann et al. [68]
ATJ-SPK – 4.795 at −20 °C
5% Distillate of palm biodiesel/Jet A-1 −27 2.95L ElGalad et al. [76]
10% Distillate of palm biodiesel/Jet A-1 −11 1.7L
15% Distillate of palm biodiesel/Jet A-1 −6 1.72L
20% Distillate of palm biodiesel/Jet A-1 −3 1.74L
Slurry BUFF (“JP-8”)F −48 2.92 at −20 °C Lamprecht [16]
Slurry BUFF (“JP-5”)F −51 3.89 at −20 °C
100% FT-SPK −50 4.7 at −20 °C Timko et al. [30]
50 vol% FT-SPK/Jet A-1 −52 4.7 at −20 °C
100% FT-SPK – 4.65 at −20 °C Lobo et al. [31]
50 vol% FT-SPK/Jet A-1 – 4.4 at −20 °C
100% Jet A-1 – 4.27 at −20 °C
Castor HEFA −62 5.3 at −20 °C Liu et al. [78]
50 vol% Castor HEFA/Jet A-1 < −77 3.3 at −20 °C
Syntroleum S-8 (FT-SPK) −59 4.6 at −20 °C Hui et al. [79]
Syntroleum R-8 (HEFA) −49 5.5 at −20 °C
100% synjet (FT-SPK) −59 4.6 at −20 °C Corporan et al. [80]
50 vol% synjet/JP-8 −54 4.3 at −20 °C
Dicyclohexylmethane + perhydrofluorene −40 2138 at −10 °C Nie et al. [81]
perhydrofluorene −15 1752 at −20 °C Nie et al. [82]
1:1 Phenylmethane/JP-10 in vol. < −75 291 at −20 °C
1:1.5 Phenylmethane/JP-10 in vol. < −75 91 at −20 °C
1:3 Phenylmethane/JP-10 in vol. < −75 29 at −20 °C
Green jet fuel fractionG – 2.85 at 40 °C Mancio et al. [83]
HEFA from hydrolyzed olein oil −30 – Sousa et al. [84]
HEFA from camelina oil – 5.004 at −20 °C Gawron and Białecki [85]
Distillate of babassu biodieselH −10.3 3.9 at 20 °C Oliveira et al. [51]
10 vol% Distillate of babassu biodiesel/Jet A-1 – 3.87 at −20 °C Ranucci et al. [86]
10 vol% Distillate of Jatropha biodiesel/Jet A-1 – 4.01 at −20 °C
10 vol% Distillate of palm kernel biodiesel/Jet A-1 – 3.78 at −20 °C
5 vol% Used cooking oil biodiesel/Jet A 14.5 4.1 at −20 °C Attia et al. [87]
5 vol% Jatropha biodiesel/Jet A 15.5 8.6 at −20 °C
5 vol% Palm biodiesel/Jet A 25.5 8.6 at −20 °C
Cyclopentanone/2-methylfuran derived fuelI −33.6 10.62 at −30 °C Zhang et al. [88]
Cyclohexanone/2-methylfuran derived fuelI −26.4 9.63 at −25 °C
Used cooking oil HEFAJ −54.3 3.8 at −20 °C Buffi et al. [89]
5 vol% Biokerosene from macauba oil/fossil jet fuel −46.8 – Silva et al. [90]
Cyclopentanone and furfuralK −24.6 10.8 at −20 °C Deng et al. [91]
Cyclohexanone and 5-HMFK −9.5 13.5 at −5 °C

A
AMJ-300 = 97.1 wt% limonane and 1.6 wt% p-cymene; UQJ-1 = 90 vol.% farnesane and 10 vol.% limonene.
B
HEFA-1 without isomerization and contains 87.2 wt% of n-paraffins; HEFA-2 with isomerization and contains 48.16 wt% of n-paraffins and 43.87 wt% of iso-
paraffins.
C
DAE = di-amyl ether; QAV-1 = civil aviation kerosene.
D
Geranyl acetone (C13H22O) is a typical oxygen containing terpenoid.
E
CBK = distillate of coconut biodiesel; PBK = distillate of palm kernel biodiesel.
F
BUFF = Battlefield-Use Fuel (FT = SPK).
G
Green jet fuel fraction from distillation of crude palm oil at 160–245 °C at 20 wt% sodium carbonate.

922
J. Yang et al. Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936

H
Distillate of babassu biodiesel has 81.32% of C10–C15 esters composition.
I
Cyclopentanone/2-methylfuran derived fuel contains 68.6% of C15, 7.9% of C11–C14 and 22.9% of C10; Cyclohexanone/2-methylfuran derived fuel contains
74.3% of C16, 8.7% of C12-C15 and 16.8% of C11.
J
Used cooking oil HEFA from SkyNRG company.
K
Cyclopentanone and furfural derived fuel contain 86.7% of C15 and 12.4% C7-C14; Cyclohexanone and 5-HMF derived fuel contain 75.4% of C18 and 22.9% of
C7–C17.
L
unknow testing temperature.

aviation fuels could cause pumping difficulties, poor atomization, in- (C15).
complete combustion and in extreme cases, the blocking of fuel in-
jectors [77]. The kinematic viscosity of synthesized hydrocarbons and 5.2. Thermal oxidation stability
their blends are summarized in Table 5.
Although most studies conducted kinematic viscosity testing for bio- The thermal oxidation stability of bio-jet fuels can be generally
jet fuels at −20 °C, some studies implemented a temperature higher or classified from two different perspectives, thermal stability and oxida-
lower than −20 °C for viscosity testing [72,71]. This to some extent tion stability. The fuel stability to oxidation at the operating tempera-
makes the available results less comparable. In general, the kinematic ture encountered in aircraft is an important performance requirement,
viscosity for most bio-jet fuels were satisfactory (< 8 mm2/s at and a high thermal oxidation stability is usually desirable.
−20 °C), even though some biokerosenes that were distillates of tri-
glyceride-based oil/resulting biodiesel had relative high viscosity
5.2.1. Thermal stability
[15,50]. Liu et al. [78] reported that the viscosity of castor HEFA and its
The thermal stability measurements are related to the amount of
50/50 blend fuel (with Jet A-1) was 5.3 mm2/s and 3.3 mm2/s at -20 °C
deposits formed in the engine fuel system at operating condition. The
respectively, indicating satisfactory fuel low-temperature fluidity. FT-
thermal stability of bio-jet fuels can be assessed using ASTM D3241 (Jet
SPK had a kinematic viscosity of 4.65 mm2/s at −20 °C, and a viscosity
Fuel Thermal Oxidation Stability Test – JFTOT). JFTOT provides two
of 4.4 mm2/s at −20 °C was observed for its 50/50 blend fuel with Jet
quantitative metrics to evaluate the deposit formation tendency of bio-
A-1 [31]. Scheuermann et al. [68] reported a kinematic viscosity of
jet fuels, including the surface deposit on the test tube and the pressure
4.795 mm2/s at −20 °C for ATJ-SPK fuel. However, SIP fuel exhibited a
drop after the fuel degradation/polymerization products are trapped.
much higher kinematic viscosity (14.28 mm2/s at −20 °C) as compared
Both of these metrics are specified in ASTM D7566-18 to ensure proper
to FT-SPK, HEFA and ATJ-SPK, and its 50 vol.% and 20 vol.% blend fuel
thermal stability of bio-jet fuels. The surface deposit on test tube should
with Jet A-1 had a viscosity of 8.37 mm2/s and 5.66 mm2/s at −20 °C
be rated less than 3 (with a scale from no deposit-0 to heavy deposit-4),
respectively. Unfortunately, there is no kinematic viscosity data avail-
and the pressure drop should be less than 25 mm Hg after a 2.5 h JFTOT
able for FT-SPK/A yet, only Scheuermann et al. [68] reported a visc-
test at a minimum temperature of 325 °C.
osity of 3.421 mm2/s for ATJ-SPK/A (15.8 vol.% of aromatics) and
Although the thermal stability of fossil jet fuel has been extensively
3.977 mm2/s for HEFA/A (19.7 vol.% of aromatics) at −20 °C.
studied over decades [18,92,93], the available literature on the thermal
There are limited studies emphasizing the relation between the ki-
stability of bio-jet fuels is limited [34,35,94]. In general, bio-jet fuels
nematic viscosity of bio-jet fuels and their chemical compositions.
have a good thermal stability, and even better than that of conventional
Chuck and Donnelly [77] assessed the kinematic viscosity of nine po-
jet fuels. Westhuizen et al. [35] reported that the fully synthesized jet
tential biofuels at a temperature range from −30 °C to 40 °C, and the
fuel (FSJF) had an excellent thermal stability even at an operating
biofuels chosen were n-butanol, n-hexanol, butyl levulinate, butyl bu-
temperature of 360 °C (> 325 °C standard). High thermal stability was
tyrate, ethyl octanoate, methyl linolenate, farnesane, ethyl cyclohexane
reported for Shell FT-SPK, Sasol FT-SPK, Rentech FT-SPK, tallow HEFA,
and limonene. The viscosity of blended fuels (20 vol.% and 50 vol.%
camelina HEFA and castor HEFA as well [34]. Amara et al. [94] stated
biofuel/Jet A-1) were evaluated as well. They stated that viscosities
that HEFA had a tube deposit rating of 1 (less than the standard of 3),
were observed to increase with decreasing temperature roughly in ac-
and almost no pressure drop was observed at an operating temperature
cordance with ideal fluid behaviour; n-butanol (12.84 mm2/s) and n-
of 325 °C after 2.5 h.
hexanol (36.21 mm2/s) had high viscosity at −20 °C, presumably due
In addition to the measurement on the thermal stability of FSJF,
to the existing hydrogen bonding between alcohol groups. Butyl buty-
Westhuizen et al. [35] assessed the thermal stability of conventional jet
rate (C8), ethyl octanoate (C10) and their blend fuels exhibited favorable
fuel for comparison. They stated that conventional jet fuel exhibited
low-temperature fluidity (viscosities of < 8 mm2/s at −20 °C), but
relatively poor thermal stability than FSJF. Similarly, Corporan et al.
methyl linolenate (C18) and its 50 vol.% blend fuel had a viscosity of
[34] observed that JP-8 was less resistant to the high temperature as
20.68 mm2/s and 12.77 mm2/s at −20 °C respectively. This indicates
compared to that of bio-jet fuels. These observations on the relatively
that the carbon chain length of biofuels was of importance for their
poor thermal stability of conventional jet fuel were attributed to the
viscosities, and shorter carbon chain length led to lower kinematic
presence of heteroatom-containing compounds. Westhuizen et al. [35]
viscosity at −20 °C, and eventually better low-temperature fluidity.
suggested that benzothiophenes (C8H6S) and other components with
Similarly, SIP (UQJ-1) fuel containing 90 vol.% of farnesane (C15)
cyclic sulphur structures could be responsible for the poor thermal
and only 10 vol.% of limonane (C10) had higher kinematic viscosity
stability of conventional jet fuel; FSJF was absent of benothiophenes
(7.714 mm2/s at −20 °C) than that of 3.818 mm2/s for SIP fuel com-
and therefore exhibited better thermal stability than conventional jet
prising 97.1 vol.% of short chain limonane [69,75]. Lamprecht [16]
fuel. Corporan et al. [34] also concluded that the improved thermal
stated that jet fuel viscosity was more relevant to the molecular weight
stability of bio-jet fuels was mainly due to the absence of heteroatom-
of chemical compounds, rather than the hydrocarbon classes; Bio-jet
containing species.
fuels that contain a larger amount of high molecular weight compounds
The thermal stability of bio-jet fuel might be influenced by the
were more susceptible to fail the viscosity test. This was supported by
presence of aromatics as well. Conventional jet fuel typically contains
Scheuermann et al. [68], that the content of diaromatics was more
10–20 wt% of aromatics, but bio-jet fuel is commonly free of aromatics
influential than that of monoaromatics for bio-jet fuel viscosity.
and mainly consisted of n-, iso- and cyclo-paraffins. The paraffinic
Overall, most bio-jet fuels (such as FT-SPK, HEFA, ATJ-SPK) had
compounds in bio-jet fuels are known to exhibit weaker tendency to
satisfactory kinetic viscosities (< 8 mm2/s at −20 °C) and thus favor-
form deposit at high temperature. Amara et al. [94] evaluated the
able fuel low-temperature fluidity. SIP tended to exhibit relatively high
thermal stability of HEFA with addition of various aromatic compounds
viscosity due to its extremely high content of long-chain farnesane
as shown in Fig. 3. From Fig. 3a, it can be clearly observed that HEFA

923
J. Yang et al.
Fig. 3. Effect of molecular structure on induction period (IP) at 140 °C: (a) influence of number of benzene cycles, (b) influence of the number of branching on
benzene ring, (c) influence of side chain length and hydrogenation (Adapted from Ref. Amara et al. [94], with permission from Elsevier).
had a satisfactory deposit rate of 1, and the addition of 25 vol.% of
xylene, ≥5 vol.% of 1-methyl-naphthalene and ≥15 vol.% of tetralin
into HEFA resulted in deposit rate greater than 3. Interestingly, only the
addition of 25 vol.% of 1-methyl-naphthalene led to pressure drop
greater than 25 mm Hg as shown in Fig. 3b.
Therefore, bio-jet fuels were proved to have satisfactory thermal
stability, even though limited literature is available. Bio-jet fuels ex-
hibited even higher thermal stability than conventional jet fuel. This is
most likely due to the presence of heteroatom-containing compounds
and aromatics in conventional jet fuel, which had stronger tendency to
form deposit at high temperatures.
5.2.2. Oxidative stability
Fuel oxidative stability is a measurement on fuel resistance to oxi-
dation at moderate temperature (100–160 °C) and in the presence of
oxygen. The fuel oxidative stability can be quantitatively measured by
the induction period (IP), which is a time period that fuel stay stable
without major degradation. Although the oxidative stability of biodiesel
at 110 °C is specified to be greater than 3 h IP and 8 h IP in ASTM D6751
and EN 14214 respectively, the oxidative stability of bio-jet fuel is not
specified in ASTM D7566-18, and only a few attempts have been made
to investigate the oxidative stability of bio-jet fuels.
Amara et al. [94] reported an IP for HEFA was nearly 1 h when the
test was carried out at the temperature of 140 °C and oxygen pressure of
7 bar. They also measured the IP for Jet A-1, which was about 2.3 h.
This relative high IP/oxidative stability for Jet A-1 was attributed to the
presence of aromatics in Jet A-1. Thus, they further evaluated the
feasibility of improving oxidative stability for HEFA via adding Jet A-1
or/and the model aromatic compounds. The addition of 25 vol.% of Jet
A-1 into HEFA resulted in about 3 h IP for Jet A-1/HEFA mixture. Be-
fore adding the model aromatic compounds into HEFA, the effect of
their molecular structure on IP were assessed as shown in Fig. 3. It can
be noticed that the diaromatic compound (1-methyl-naphthalene, 1-
MN) had the highest IP, followed by the monoaromatics. The number of
methyl groups on the benzene ring did not significantly affect the IP
values as illustrated in Fig. 3b. Unfortunately, the saturated hydro-
carbons had much lower IP values compared to aromatic compounds as
shown in Fig. 3c. With knowing the influence of these molecular
structures on IP values, the addition of model compounds into HEAF
were then further evaluated and the IP values for the mixtures were
presented in Fig. 4a. It can be observed that the addition of 5 vol.% of 1-
MN (diaromatics) significantly improved the oxidative stability of
HEFA from ab1 h to 8 h, indicating a significant improvement on
HEFA’s oxidative stability. Monoaromatics exhibited moderate im-
provement on HEFA’ oxidative stability. Unfortunately, the cyclic al-
kane had almost no enhancement on HEFA’s oxidative stability. The
author also investigated the effect of adding these model compounds
into pure n-decane, in order to gain more insights of their enhance-
ments on oxidative stability as shown in Fig. 4b.
Apart from the thorough investigation on the oxidative stability of
HEFA by Amara et al. [94], Corporan et al. [34] attempted to study the
924
Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936
oxidative stability of HEFA and FT-SPK as well. They reported that the
oxygen consumption rate for FT-SPK and HEFA were higher than that of
conventional JP-8, indicating a relatively poor oxidative stability of FT-
SPK and HEFA. These observations were in agreement with results
presented by Amara et al. [94], and further confirmed that the poor
oxidative stability were due to the absence of aromatics in FT-SPK and
HEFA. Moreover, synthesized FT-SPK and HEFA were almost free of
antioxidants, but fossil jet fuels usually contain a certain amount of
phenolic antioxidants introduced from crude oil [35,95,96] which also
contributed to a low oxidative stability of bio-jet fuels.
In general, the oxidative stability of bio-jet fuels was relatively poor
as compared to that of conventional jet fuels. This is mainly attributed
to the absence of aromatics or/and antioxidants in bio-jet fuels.
5.3. Combustion characteristics
In comparison with the limited research on thermal and oxidative
stability of bio-jet fuels, the combustion characteristics of alternative jet
fuel have been widely studied. The combustion characteristics of bio-jet
fuel are of significant importance, especially in the context of a growing
awareness on GHG emissions and climate change. Bio-jet fuel is con-
tinuously vaporized and ignited along with the fast-flowing hot air in an
aviation turbine engine. Particulates and unburned hydrocarbons are
resulted from incomplete combustions. These particulates will be
visible as smoke or/and soot if the concentration is high enough. The
combustion characteristics of bio-jet fuel can be assessed by parameters
such as smoke point, the emissions of particulate matter (PM), mon-
oxide (CO) and carbon dioxide (CO2), and derived cetane number
(DCN) that characterize fuel ignition property. These combustion
characteristics of bio-jet fuels were summarized in Table 6. It is notable
that this work aims to fill the knowledge gap in a thorough evaluation
of bio-jet fuels performance. Since the combustion characteristics of
bio-jet fuel can be found in related reviews [7,8], in our study, they are
not discussed as explicit as other physicochemical properties that are
still a lack of thorough evaluations.
5.3.1. Smoke point
Smoke point is typically used to evaluate combustion properties of
fossil jet fuels, which requires a minimum of 25 mm height of flame
without smoking. A high smoke point indicates that fuel has a low
smoke-producing tendency. There is no smoke point limit for synthe-
sized hydrocarbons in ASTM D7566, but still some attempts have been
made to investigate the smoke point of bio-jet fuels [34,50,80]. Cor-
poran et al. [34] reported that the smoke point of FT-SPK and HEFA
were larger than 40 mm, showing their outstanding combustion per-
formance. A high smoke point of > 50 mm was found for a 100% synjet
fuel (FT-SPK) as well, but a conventional jet fuel (JP-8) only had a
smoke point of 25 mm [80]. This observed difference in smoke point
between synjet and JP-8 was attributed to their aromatics contents.
Aromatic compounds had higher tendency to form soot than paraffins,
and therefore JP-8 containing 15.9 vol.% of aromatics exhibited lower
J. Yang et al. Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936

Fig. 4. Impact of the addition of model compounds on the oxidative stability of: (a) HEFA at 140 °C, (b) n-decane at 140 °C (Adapted from Ref. Amara et al. [95], with
permission from Elsevier).

smoke point than that of aromatics-free synjet. The smoke point of
blended fuels (synjet/JP-8) were evaluated as well, and increasing the
content of synjet from 25 vol.% to 75 vol.% resulted in improvement on
the smoke point from 29 to 46 mm [80]. A slight increase in Jet A-1
smoke point (from 27.1 to 29.1 mm) was also obtained by an addition
of 20 vol.% of biokerosene (distillate of palm kernel biodiesel) into Jet
A-1 [50].
In addition to smoke point, the threshold sooting index (TSI) have
been used to evaluate the soot formation tendency for conventional jet
fuels and bio-jet fuels [7]. JP-8 was reported to have a TSI of 19.28,
while Shell FT-SPK, Sasol FT-SPK, camelina HEFA and tallow HEFA had
a relatively low TSI of 9.11, 17.28, 11.99 and 11.58 respectively. TSI is
also commonly treated as one of emulated fuel properties during the
development of jet fuel surrogate. Yu et al. [97] recently developed a
surrogate for Jet A (POSF 4658) via an intelligent optimization meth-
odology, and the optimized mole fraction for n-dodecane, iso-octane,
toluene, iso-cetane and decalin was 0.3706, 0.0195, 0.2591, 0.2059 and
0.1449 respectively. This newly proposed jet fuel surrogate (JFS) ex-
hibited excellent prediction/reproducibility for TSI and some other
properties as shown in Fig. 5.

Table 6
The combustion characteristics of bio-jet fuels.
Fuel Smokepoint DCN Particulate matterD Gaseous emissionsE Ref.

NOx CO UHC CO2

50 vol% camelina HEFA/Jet A – – 50–70% reduction – – – – Moore et al. [100]

Slurry BUFF (“JP-8”)A – 68 – – – – – Lamprecht [16]
Slurry BUFF (“JP-5”)A – 70.3 – – – – –
100% FT-SPK 60%F – 70% PMN 10% 20% – 3.100 g/kg fuel Timko et al. [30]
50 vol.% FT-SPK/Jet A-1 40%F – 50% PMN 5% minor change – 3.129 g/kg fuel
100% FT-SPK – – 52% PMN; 62% PMM – – – 3.100 g/kg fuel Lobo et al. [31]
50 vol.% FT-SPK/Jet A-1 – – 34% PMN; 39% PMM – – – 3.127 g/kg fuel
100% Jet A-1 – – – – – – 3.155 g/kg fuel
Shell FT-SPK 40 – 80% minor change 25% 25% minor change Corporan et al. [34]
Sasol FT-SPK > 40 – 60% minor change 10% 30% minor change
50 vol.% Shell FT-SPK/JP-8 – – 40% – 5% 3% –
50 vol.% Sasol FT-SPK/JP-8 – – 25% – 8% 22% –
20 vol.% PBK/Jet A-1 29.1 – – – – – – Llamas et al. [50]
Jet A – 49.35 – – – – – Hui et al. [79]
Syntroleum S-8 (FT-SPK) – 66.50 – – – – –
Syntroleum R-8 (HEFA) – 66.27 – – – – –
Shell FT-SPK – 64.69 – – – – –
Sasol FT-IPK – 33.46 – – – – –
UPO Camelina HEFA – 60.70 – – – – –
UPO Tallow HEFA – 65.85 – – – – –
100% synjet (FT-SPK) > 50 – 90% PMN; 95% PMM minor change minor change minor change minor change Corporan et al. [80]
50 vol.% synjet/JP-8 37.5 – 50% PMN; 50% PMM – – 15 ppm –
Farensane – 59.1 – – – – – Won et al. [110]
Mixture of n-dodecane/iso-octane – 58.9 – – – – –
Coconut HEFA-1B 92.7 – – – – – 76% Hong et al. [15]
Coconut HEFA-2B 79.5 – – – – – 81%
Used cooking oil HEFAC > 50 – – – – – – Buffi et al. [89]

A
BUFF = Battlefield-Use Fuel (FT = SPK).
B
HEFA-1 without isomerization and contains 87.2 wt% of n-paraffins; HEFA-2 with isomerization and contains 48.16 wt% of n-paraffins and 43.87 wt% of iso-
paraffins.
C
Used cooking oil HEFA from SkyNRG company.
D
reduction percentage of PMN (particulate matter number) and PMM (particulate matter mass).
E
reduction percentage.
F
reduction percentage on soot formation.

925
J. Yang et al.
Fig. 5. Evaluation of emulated properties for jet fuel surrogates. JFS indicates the jet fuel surrogate developed by Yu et al. (2018), and UM1, UM2, Aachen, MURI2,
S5 and HEX12 indicates other available surrogates (Adapted from Ref. Yu et al. [97], with the permission from Elsevier).
5.3.2. Particulate matter (PM) emissions
The emission of PM can contribute to haze and smog formation, and
can be harmful if inhaled. The percent of aromatics in alternative jet
fuel has been considered as the primary factors for their PM emissions
[30,31,34,35,80,98,99]. Lobo et al. [31] proposed that 100% FT-SPK
had about 52% of PM number reduction and 62% PM mass reduction,
and this was attributed to its extremely low amount of aromatics; a 50%
FT-SPK blended jet fuel comprised 9.25 vol.% aromatic content, and
approximately 34% PM number and 39% PM mass reduction were
achieved. Moore et al. [100] evaluated the particle emissions from
aircraft (NASA DC-8, using biofuel in-flight) via a sampling jet (NASA
HU-25) as shown in Fig. 6, and they reported that the aviation fuel (50/
50 camelina HEFA/Jet A in volume) blend reduced the PM number and
mass emissions immediately behind the NASA DC-8 aircraft by
50–70%.Fig. 7
Additionally, the particle size of PM generated from bio-jet fuels
were generally 35% smaller than fossil jet fuels, which resulted from a
lower concentration of available soot nuclei for surface growth and
agglomeration reactions [34]. Oßwald et al. [101] conducted a detailed
kinetic modeling of farnesane and p-cymene (aromatic) combustion,
and found that farnesane showed very little tendency to produce soot
precursors, however, p-cymene generated considerably more naphtha-
lene or respective isomers. This was confirmed by Calcote and Manos
[102] that the soot propensities for different hydrocarbon classes were
generally ranked as aromatics > cyclic alkanes > branched al-
kanes > linear alkanes. Hence, the absence of aromatics in bio-jet fuels
results in less PM emissions compared to conventional jet fuels.
5.3.3. Gaseous emissions
The gaseous emissions from jet fuels commonly refer to the emission
of CO, CO2, NOx and unburned hydrocarbon (UHC), and these emis-
sions could be different at various operating conditions, such as take-
off, top of climb, cruise, low power and ground idle [103]. The gaseous
emissions of bio-jet fuels have been widely studied
[30,34,79,104–109]. Timko et al. [30] comprehensively assessed CO
and NOx emissions from natural gas-derived FT-SPK and its 50/50 jet
fuel blend. They found that NOx reduction was 10% and 5% for pure
FT-SPK and blend fuel respectively, but the reduction of CO emission
was only observed for FT-SPK. Corporan et al. [34] reported slightly
Fig. 6. The side view of NASA HU-25 Falcon aircraft sampling the NASA DC-8 contrail from Moore et al. [100].
926
Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936
different results that the emissions of NOx and CO2 from FT-SPK and
HEFA were both similar to that of JP-8, but CO and UHC emissions were
10–25% less than JP-8. It was assumed that the lack of relatively stable
aromatics in FT-SPK and HEFA facilitated more complete fuel com-
bustion, thus reducing CO and UHC emissions.
Gaspar and Sousa [103] numerically simulated the combustion
characteristics of bio-jet fuel in a turbofan aero-engine, and reported
about 6.8% and 8–18% reduction for CO and NOx emission respec-
tively, but 5–10% increment in UHC emission. They also suggested that
both CO and UHC emissions could be significantly influenced by the
effect of the fuel–air ratio, which was dependent on the operating
conditions as well as the type of engine. It is notable that the reduction
in gaseous emissions from bio-jet fuel combustion were generally less
than that of PM emissions (30–70% of reduction as shown in Section
5.3.2). This was supported by Gaspar and Sousa [103], that the re-
duction in pollution emissions from bio-jet fuels occurred mostly in PM
emissions (about 72%). Overall, the gaseous emissions from bio-jet
fuels are slightly lower or/and comparable to that of fossil jet fuels
depending on the gas species and engine operating conditions.
5.3.4. Derived cetane number
Derived Cetane Number (DCN) is a representative for the fuel ig-
nition characteristic in a compression ignition engine, even though it is
not specified in ASTM D7566-18. A higher DCN means shorter ignition
delay time, which allows fuels to combust more completely.
Consequently, better combustion performance with more power and
fewer harmful emissions could be achieved. Hui et al. [79] investigated
the ignition property of FT-SPK, HEFA and Jet A, and they reported that
Jet A had a DCN of 49.35, which was much lower than that of alter-
native jet fuels (DCN > 60) with the exception of Sasol FT-SPK
(DCN = 33.46). This is because Sasol SPK contained very little n-par-
affins but a large amount of iso-paraffins (> 80 wt%), which were less
reactive than n-paraffins. Therefore, Sasol FT-SPK’s low DCN was
mainly due to a lack of the more reactive n-paraffins [79]. It is
worthwhile to note that the content of aromatics in jet fuels could be
critical for their ignition characteristics as well, since the aromatic
compounds are known to be stable due to the unique bonding in ben-
zene ring. This is supported by the relatively low DCN for Jet A
(DCN = 49.35) compared to that of aromatics-free bio-jet fuels
J. Yang et al. Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936

Fig. 7. Boiling curve for ethyl cyclohexane, methyl linolenate, Jet A-1 and their blend fuels (Adapted from ref. Scheuermann et al. [68], with the permission from
Elsevier).

(DCN > 60). Table 7

Overall, the combustion performance of alternative jet fuels and Studies on the compatibility of bio-jet fuels.
their blends exhibited desirable smoke point, environmentally in- Fuel Volume swell Sulfur content Ref.
nocuous PM and gaseous emissions and satisfactory DCN. The absence (%) (ppm)
of aromatics in bio-jet fuel played a key role in obtaining these favor-
able combustion characteristics. Coconut HEFA-1A – 11 Hong et al. [15]
Coconut HEFA-2A – 10
Jet A-1 – 470
5.4. Compatibility with current aviation fueling system Shell FT-SPK 9.6 < 10 Corporan et al.
[34]
Sasol FT-SPK 9.5 < 10
Although bio-jet fuels exhibited excellent low temperature fluidity,
Rentech FT-SPK 7.8 < 10
thermal stability and combustion characteristics as mentioned above, Tallow HEFA 8.6 < 10
their lubricity and compatibility with elastomers in current aviation Camelina HEFA 9.1 < 10
fueling system are of considerable concerns. Conventional jet fuels ty- Syntroleum S-8 (FT- 8.1 –
SPK)
pically comprise 10–20% aromatics, which were able to soften and
JP-8 16.6 640
swell O-ring seals properly; however, bio-based jet fuels (almost aro- Castor HEFA – 0 Liu et al. [78]
matics-free) tended to shrink and harden O-ring seals and eventually 50 vol.% Castor HEFA/ – < 20
cause fuel leakage [25,34,111–114]. The volume swell of seal materials Jet A-1
and lubricity were discussed in detail in this section to investigate the 100% synjet (FT-SPK) – < 0.01 Corporan et al.
[80]
compatibility of bio-jet fuels with current aviation fueling system.
50 vol.% synjet/JP-8 – 0.04
Used cooking oil HEFAB – < 0.3 Buffi et al. [89]
5.4.1. Volume swell of seal materials
A
Volume swell of seal materials in aviation systems mainly depends HEFA-1 without isomerization and contains 87.2 wt% of n-paraffins;
on the interaction strength between jet fuels and seal materials. This HEFA-2 with isomerization and contains 48.16 wt% of n-paraffins and 43.87 wt
% of iso-paraffins.
interaction strength closely relates to the structure and composition of B
Used cooking oil HEFA from SkyNRG company.
the chemical compounds in alternative jet fuels. Although the percent
of volume swell of seal materials is not specified for either synthesized
percent of nitrile rubber exposed to conventional JP-8 (16.6%) was still
hydrocarbons or the blend fuel in ASTM D7566-18, a minimum of 8 wt
higher than Shell FT-SPK, 9.6% volume swell was comparable to that
% aromatics is required for the blend fuel to ensure the desirable fuel
for the previously flight-tested Syntroleum S-8 fuel. It has also been
“fit for purpose” properties (such as volume swell of elastomers). A few
pointed out that the blend fuel of these synthesized hydrocarbons and
efforts have been contributed to study the impact of bio-jet fuels on the
JP-8 could exhibit satisfactory volume swell.
volume swell of seal materials as presented in Table 7.
The addition of aromatics as a surrogate source for low-aromatic
Corporan et al. [34] provided fundamental knowledge about the
alternative jet fuels was generally feasible, even though a weaker effect
volume swell characteristics of elastomer materials when interacting
on elastomer change was observed compared to that of the petroleum
with synthesized hydrocarbon fuels. They proposed that the ability of
jet fuels [112]. It is necessary to mention that the compatibility of bio-
FT-SPK and HEFA to penetrate polymer-based O-ring seals depended on
jet fuels with elastomers also depends on the various O-ring materials.
their molecular weight distributions and compositions. Specifically,
For instance, nitrile rubber that is commonly used as O-ring material in
lighter fuels swelled O-ring seals more compared to heavier fuels, and
aircraft fuel system greatly responses to aromatics, but the response of
linear molecules were more mobile than branched ones. Their results on
other materials such as fluorosilicone and fluorocarbon to aromatics are
the volume swell character of nitrile rubber showed that Shell FT-SPK
much less [113].
fuel containing a relatively narrow carbon range (dominated by C9 and
The addition of aromatics into alternative jet fuels can improve their
C10 linear n-paraffins) had the highest percent of volume swell (9.6%)
compatibility with the current aviation fueling system, meanwhile, it
among the alternative jet fuels of interest. Although the volume swell

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J. Yang et al. Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936

Table 8
The distillation property and flash point of bio-jet fuels.
Fuel Distillation property Flash point (°C) Ref.

Initial BP 10% rec. 50% rec. 90% rec. Final BP

A
Coconut HEFA-1 141 191 218 283 308 47 Hong et al. [15]
Coconut HEFA-2A 126 150 211 275 306 45
2 vol.% HEFA-1/Jet A-1 145.3 164.7 187.9 215.1 248.6 –
5 vol.% HEFA-1/Jet A-1 145.2 165.1 188.6 217.4 249.1 –
10 vol.% HEFA-1/Jet A-1 144.8 165.5 190.0 222.8 259.1 –
Slurry BUFF (“JP-8”)B 144 158 187 235 247 39 Lamprecht [16]
Slurry BUFF (“JP-5”)B 174 186 196 220 231 55
100% FT-SPK 153 171 208 247 260 – Timko et al. [30]
Shell FT-SPK – 162 169 184 198 44 Corporan et al. [34]
Sasol FT-SPK – 166 180 208 228 44
Rentech FT-SPK – 168 216 263 275 44
Tallow HEFA – 179 210 243 255 55
Camelina HEFA – 161 182 237 259 43
Castor HEFA 200–300 – – – – 55 Liu et al. [78]
50 vol.% Castor HEFA/Jet A-1 200–300 – – – – 43
20 vol.% PBK/Jet A-1C – – – – – 45.5 Llamas et al. [50]
SIP (AMJ-300)D – – – – – 44.37 Renninger and McPhee [62]
SIP (UQI-1)D – – – – – 56.45 Brennan et al. [75]
100% Farnesene – – – – 260 > 95 Chuck and Donnelly [77]
20 vol.% Farnesene/Jet A-1 195 205 235 290 – 46
50 vol.% Farnesene/Jet A-1 215 220 260 > 330 – 50
Syntroleum S-8 (FT-SPK) – – – – – 49 Hui et al. [79]
Syntroleum R-8 (HEFA) – – – – – 48
100% synjet (FT-SPK) – – – – 271 49 Corporan et al. [80]
50 vol.% synjet/JP-8 – – – – 268 48
JP-8 182.7 187.9 209.3 – – – Smith and Bruno [122]
Coal-based jet fuel 199.0 201.5 213.5 – – –
Tallow HEFA 165 179 210 243 255 – Wierzbicki et al. [123]
FT-SPK 155 164 176 200 225 –
ATJ-SPK 174.6 178 180.9 219.9 249.8 47.5 Scheuermann et al. [68]
SIP 249 249 249 249 249 –
HEFA 148.9 162.9 210.3 270.8 277.6 42
FT-SPK 166 171.5 179.5 198.7 215.2 46
ATJ-SPK/A 164.8 174.8 186.7 205.6 249.6 48.5
HEFA/A 152.1 171.4 200.1 244.8 258.5 42.5
Jet A-1 151.2–170.6 167.2–175.3 186.4–200.2 216.3–238.9 243.7–258.5 40.5–53.0
Di-amyl ether (DAE) 142 – – – – 48 Cataluña et al. [72]
Green jet fuel fractionE 168 193 223 256 273 – Mancio et al. [83]
Used cooking oil HEFAF – – – – – 42 Buffi et al. [89]
Geranyl acetoneG – – – – – 51 Ju et al. [73]

A
HEFA-1 without isomerization and contains 87.2 wt% of n-paraffins; HEFA-2 with isomerization and contains 48.16 wt% of n-paraffins and 43.87 wt% of iso-
paraffins.
B
BUFF = Battlefield-Use Fuel (FT = SPK).
C
AMJ-300 = 97.1 wt% limonane and 1.6 wt% p-cymene; UQJ-1 = 90 vol.% farnesane and 10 vol.% limonene.
D
AMJ-300 = 97.1 wt% limonane and 1.6 wt% p-cymene; UQJ-1 = 90 vol.% farnesane and 10 vol.% limonene.
E
Green jet fuel fraction from distillation of crude palm oil at 160–245 °C at 20 wt% sodium carbonate.
F
Used cooking oil HEFA from SkyNRG company.
G
Geranyl acetone (C13H22O) is a typical oxygen containing terpenoid.

might also increase the soot formation tendency that further raises PM obtaining satisfactory percent of volume swell compared to that of
emissions as mentioned in Section 5.3.2. A study of the inter- conventional jet fuels. Although the addition of aromatics into bio-jet
dependence between the volume swell and soot formation tendency of fuels can improve their compatibility with the current aviation fueling
bio-jet fuels after the addition of aromatics was conducted by DeWitt system, the interdependence between the volume swell and soot for-
et al. [115]. The volume swell and PM emissions were related to both mation tendency needs to be aware.
the concentrations and types of aromatics within the fuel, not solely on
the total aromatics concentration. Increasing aromatics concentration
5.4.2. Lubricity
generally enhanced the volume swell and PM emissions. Aromatics that
Lubricity, a measure of a fuel’s ability to reduce wear in engine
have relatively high molecular weight, such as naphthalene, had
components, is another concern for bio-jet fuels. No lubricity limit is
stronger interaction strength with seal materials (nitrile) compared to
specified for synthesized hydrocarbons in ASTM D7566-18, but the
low molecular weight aromatics. PM emissions increased as the mole-
aviation turbine fuel containing synthesized hydrocarbon can have up
cular weight of aromatics increased, which was attributed to an easier
to 0.85 mm wear scar diameter as determined by test method D5001.
formation of soot precursors from high molecular weight aromatics
Although the lubricity of synthesized hydrocarbons is not specified and
[115]. They concluded that desirable volume swell and satisfactory PM
no available wear scar diameter data for them in the literature, it has
emissions can be jointly achieved by either the addition of < 10% of
been reported that the lubricity of bio-jet fuel is closely related to the
high molecular weight aromatics or > 10% of low molecular weight
presence of compounds that have polar nature [116].
aromatics.
The naturally occurring oxygen-, nitrogen-, and sulfur-containing
In conclusion, the aromatics-free bio-jet fuels were less capable of
compounds in conventional jet fuels are responsible for their

928
J. Yang et al.
satisfactory lubricity, but these compounds are highly possible to be
removed from synthesized hydrocarbons during severe hydrotreatment
processes, resulting in relative poor lubricity for bio-jet fuels [25,116].
The poor lubricity of bio-jet fuels can be eliminated by either using
additives (as low as 10 ppm) or blending with conventional jet fuels
that typically contain around 700 ppm sulfur (as presented in Table 7).
ASTM D7566 is a set of specifications that balance all aspects of fuel
properties to ensure desirable fuel performance. For instance, the re-
quirement of a minimum 8 wt% of aromatics in final blended jet fuels
balances bio-jet fuels’ compatibility and combustion properties etc.
Similarly, FAME presented in HEFA is specified to be less than 5 ppm in
ASTM D7566 (mainly due to its relatively poor low temperature
fluidity), but the presence of FAME in the HEFA can enhance the HEFA
fuel lubricity [25,117]. Therefore, FAME can be treated as the lubricity
enhancing additives for HEFA fuel.
In general, bio-jet fuels exhibited less desirable lubricity than con-
ventional jet fuel due to the lack of compounds that have polar nature.
Significantly more research efforts are needed to investigate the lu-
bricity of bio-jet fuels, which is of importance in the process of moving
toward the fully ‘drop-in’ bio-jet fuels, rather than blending with fossil
jet fuels.
5.5. Fuel volatility
The fuel volatility of bio-jet fuels represents the tendency of fuel to
vaporize, which can be generally characterized by the distillation
property and flash point. The distillation property of bio-jet fuel can be
determined by the percent of recovery fraction at different tempera-
tures, and the flash point is defined as the lowest temperature at which
fuel will form a flammable mixture with air. The distillation property
and flash point of bio-jet fuel are summarized in Table 8 and discussed
as follows.
5.5.1. Distillation property
The distillation property of alternative jet fuels is critical for process
controllability, energy integration and product optimization during fuel
production processes [118–121]. As for FT-SPK, HEFA, FT-SPK/A and
ATJ-SPK, ASTM D7566-18 specifies that 10% recovery must be
achieved at a maximum temperature of 205 °C (T10) to ensure suffi-
cient ignition-starting, and the final boiling point (FBP) is limited at a
maximum temperature of 300 °C to exclude heavy compound fractions.
The distillation range for SIP is relatively narrow (10% recovery and
FBP at a maximum temperature of 250 °C and 255 °C respectively). This
is because of the high unity of SIP fuel (containing at least 97 wt% of
iso-paraffins).
Many studies reported that FT-SPK and HEFA fitted well within the
specified distillation range as presented in Table
[16,30,34,77,122,123]. For instance, Wierzbicki et al. [123] reported
that tallow HEFA had a T10 of 179 °C (< 205 °C) and FBP of 255 °C
(< 300 °C); and FT-SPK exhibited satisfactory distillation profile as well
(T10 = 179 °C and FBP = 225 °C). A favorable FBP of 268 °C was re-
ported for 50 vol.% FT-SPK/JP-8 fuel [80]. Chuck and Donnelly [77]
evaluated the distillation property for farnesene and its blend fuel
(20 vol.% and 50 vol.% farnesene/Jet A-1), unfortunately, farnesene
cannot be considered as a SIP fuel, instead of farnesane. They also
presented the distillation property for ethyl cyclohexane (C8H16), me-
thyl linolenate (C19H32O2) and their blend fuels with Jet A-1 as shown
in Fig. 6. It can be clearly observed that ethyl cyclohexane and its blend
fuels had lower boiling points at all recovery fractions than that of Jet
A-1. This is due to the fact that ethyl cyclohexane has shorter carbon
chain length (C8) than Jet A-1 that usually has an average carbon chain
length of C10-C12. This is supported by the distillation property of me-
thyl linolenate and its blend fuels, which has a carbon chain length of
C19 and exhibited higher boiling points at all recovery fractions than
that of Jet A-1. Therefore, the carbon chain length is a dominant factor
for boiling point, and ultimately, for the bio-jet fuel distillation
Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936
property.
The influence of chemical compositions on the distillation property
of bio-jet fuels were thoroughly investigated by Scheuermann et al.
[68]. They also suggested that the high distillation temperature for 90%
fraction and FBP for HEFA fuel was due to its high-boiling point n-
alkanes (up to 17 carbon atoms). It is notable that although the dis-
tillation profiles were widely reported for bio-jet fuels, the influence of
chemical compositions on the distillation property of bio-jet fuels were
rarely studied.
Some surrogate modelling studies have been carried out to examine
the distillation properties of alternative jet fuels [122,124,125]. Huber
et al. [124] provided a seven-component surrogate mixture model for
the prediction of thermophysical properties of synthetic S-8 jet fuel
derived from natural gas. A similar study was presented by Smith and
Bruno [122], on which they modeled the distillation curve for JP-8 and
coal-based jet fuel on the basis of their fuel chemical fractions. Edwards
and Maurice [125] made valuable recommendations on surrogate jet
fuels based on different physical properties, such as fuel vaporization,
heat transfer, thermal stability and soot formation.
5.5.2. Flash point
Flash point is a typical indicator for fuel volatility. It is an important
fuel handling parameter that is commonly used to assess the overall
flammability hazard during storage and shipping. A minimum of 38 °C
flash point is specified for FT-SPK, HEFA, FT-SPK/A and ATJ-SPK in
ASTM D7566-18. However, SIP fuel is required to have a minimum
flash point of 100 °C. This is because the SIP fuel mainly consists of long
chain farnesane (C15), which naturally exhibits high flash point. This
can be referred to the flash point specification for biodiesel (93 °C in
ASTM D6751) that has long carbon chain length as well [42]. The re-
ported flash point of bio-jet fuels are generally in great agreement with
ASTM D7566 [49,50,77,79] as shown in Table 8.
A flash point of 42 °C (> 38 °C standard) was reported for HEFA
derived from used cooking oil [89]. FT-SPK and ATJ-SPK had a flash
point of 46 °C and 47.5 °C respectively [68]. A greater than 95 °C flash
point was reported for 100% farnesene, but no available literature data
can be found for SIP fuel yet. Chuck and Donnelly [77] stated that the
flash point of blended jet fuels were largely influenced by the compo-
nents with low flash point. Unfortunately, only Scheuermann et al. [68]
explored the influence of bio-jet fuel chemical compositions on the flash
point, and suggested that the flash point was low for bio-jet fuel in the
presence of low-boiling point aliphatic compounds and high in the
presence of higher boiling-point aromatic compounds.
In summary, bio-jet fuels exhibited satisfactory distillation property
and flash point. The distillation properties of bio-jet fuels were mainly
influenced by the carbon chain length, and the flash point could be
8 affected by the presence of low-boiling point aliphatic compounds and
high-boiling point aromatic compounds. Although the distillation pro-
files and flash points have been reported for various bio-jet fuels, more
research efforts are required to thoroughly explore the influence of
chemical compositions on the distillation property and flash point of
bio-jet fuels.
5.6. Fuel metering and aircraft range
Aircraft operations are closely related to the energy density of fuel
(in this instance as heat) and the convertibility of heat into mechanical
power. A low heat energy from fuel combustion is accompanied by an
increase in fuel consumption and ultimately higher operation costs. The
density and net heat of combustion are two characteristic parameters
for fuel metering and aircraft range performance. This is because the
total amount of heat energy (MJ) is equal to the fuel density (kg/
m3) × fuel tank volume (m3) × the net heat of combustion (MJ/kg); at
a given volume of fuel tank, more heat energy can be obtained from
aviation fuels that have higher density and net heat of combustion.
Consequently, longer flight range or/and heavier payload mass are
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J. Yang et al. Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936

Table 9
The density and net heat of combustion of bio-jet fuels.
Fuel Density at 15 °C (kg/m3) Net heat of combustion (MJ/kg) H/C ratio Ref.

Coconut HEFA-1 A
759 42.48 – Hong et al. [15]
Coconut HEFA-2A 758 44.97 –
80 vol.% HEFA-1/Jet A-1 – 42.8 –
27.3 vol.% HEFA-1/Jet 775 – –
29 vol.% HEFA-2/Jet A-1 775 – –
Slurry BUFF (“JP-8”)B 740 – – Lamprecht [16]
Slurry BUFF (“JP-5”)B 748 –
100% FT-SPK 755 44.1H
– Timko et al. [30]
50 vol.% FT-SPK/Jet A-1 776 43.7H –
100% FT-SPK – 44.1 2.17 Lobo et al. [31]
50 vol.% FT-SPK/Jet A-1 – 43.6 2.04
100% Jet A-1 – 43.3 1.92
Shell FT-SPK 737 44.1 – Corporan et al. [34]
Sasol FT-SPK 762 44.2 –
Rentech FT-SPK 763 44.2 –
Tallow HEFA 758 44.1 –
Camelina HEFA 751 44.1 –
ATJ-SPK 757.1 – – Scheuermann et al. [68]
SIP 773.1 – –
HEFA 756.7 – –
FT-SPK 761.2 – –
ATJ-SPK/A 785.9 – –
HEFA/A 805.2 – –
Jet A-1 795–818 – –
Castor HEFA 758 – – Liu et al. [78]
50 vol.% Castor HEFA/Jet A-1 751 – –
Coconut biokerosene (CBK)C 867 35.06 – Llamas et al. [50]
Palm kernel biokerosene (PBK)C – 34.89 –
20 vol.% PBK/Jet A-1 811.8 41.19 –
JP-8 799 43 1.92 Bi et al. [55]
Aromatic biofuel (ABF) 865 42.5 1.40
Cyclic alkane biofuel (CABF) 817 45.9 1.98
SIP (AMJ-300)D 768 43.33 – Renninger and McPhee [62]
SIP (UQI-1)D 778 43.93 – Brennan et al. [75]
100% Farnesene 795 43 – Chuck and Donnelly [77]
20 vol.% Farnesene/Jet A-1 790 – –
50 vol.% Farnesene/Jet A-1 785 – –
Syntroleum S-8 (FT-SPK) 757 44.1 2.152 Hui et al. [79]
Syntroleum R-8 (HEFA) 762 44.1 2.152
Farensane – – 2.133 Won et al. [110]
Mixture of n-dodecane/iso-octane – – 2.198
Tallow HEFA – 46.2U – Wierzbicki et al. [123]
FT-SPK – 46.2U –
60 vol.% 5-methylundencane/carylophyllane isomers 806 47.5 – Harvey et al. [127]
Farnesene 840 47 – Rude and Schirme [64]
Branched cyclohexane fuel 804 – – Han et al. [70]
Branched decalin fuel 880 42 – Nie et al. [71]
Dicyclohexylmethane + perhydrofluorene 930 – – Nie et al. [81]
Perhydrofluorene 959 43.12 – Nie et al. [82]
1:1 Perhydrofluorene/JP-10 950 43.37 –
1:1.5 Perhydrofluorene/JP-10 940 42.34 –
1:3 Perhydrofluorene/JP-10 940 42.23 –
Di-amyl ether (DAE) 789 41.4 – Cataluña et al. [72]
10% DAE/QAV-1E 823 – –
20% DAE/QAV-1E 819 – –
30% DAE/QAV-1E 811 – –
Green jet fuel fractionF 792 – – Mancio et al. [83]
HEFA from camelina oil 780 43.7 – Gawron and Białecki [85]
Aromatized-hydrogenated fuel 808 44.4U – Li et al. [74]
5% Distillate of palm biodiesel/Jet A-1 802 – 3.63 ElGalad et al. [76]
10% Distillate of palm biodiesel/Jet A-1 817 – 3.17
15% Distillate of palm biodiesel/Jet A-1 820 – 3
20% Distillate of palm biodiesel/Jet A-1 822 – 3.1
Distillate of babassu biodieselG 875 38.1 – Oliveira et al. [51]
10 vol.% Distillate of babassu biodiesel/Jet A-1 801 44.19U – Ranucci et al. [86]
10 vol.% Distillate of Jatropha biodiesel/Jet A-1 801 44.07U –
10 vol.% Distillate of palm kernel biodiesel/Jet A-1 801 43.99U –
5 vol.% Used cooking oil biodiesel/Jet A – 43.15U – Attia et al. [87]
5 vol.% Jatropha biodiesel/Jet A – 42.97U –
5 vol.% Palm biodiesel/Jet A – 43.12U –
10% Butyl-butyrate/RP-3 860 34.1 – Chen et al. [128]
30% Butyl-butyrate/RP-3 850 32.3 –
50% Butyl-butyrate/RP-3 830 30.5 –
Cyclopentanone/2-methylfuran derived fuelI 819 – – Zhang et al. [88]
(continued on next page)

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J. Yang et al. Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936

Table 9 (continued)

Fuel Density at 15 °C (kg/m3) Net heat of combustion (MJ/kg) H/C ratio Ref.

Cyclohexanone/2-methylfuran derived fuelI

825 – –
Used cooking oil HEFAJ 760 44 – Buffi et al. [89]
Geranyl acetone derived fuelK 800 45U – Ju et al. [73]
Biofuel-1L 870 42.5U 1.4 Wu et al. [129]
Biofuel-2L 810 44.9U 1.9
Cyclopentanone and furfural derived fuelM 815 – – Deng et al. [91]
Cyclohexanone and 5-HMF derived fuelM 826 – –

A
HEFA-1 without isomerization and contains 87.2 wt% of n-paraffins; HEFA-2 with isomerization and contains 48.16 wt% of n-paraffins and 43.87 wt% of iso-
paraffins.
B
BUFF = Battlefield-Use Fuel (FT = SPK).
C
CBK = distillate of coconut biodiesel; PBK = distillate of palm kernel biodiesel.
D
AMJ-300 = 97.1 wt% limonane and 1.6 wt% p-cymene; UQJ-1 = 90 vol.% farnesane and 10 vol.% limonene.
E
AMJ-300 = 97.1 wt% limonane and 1.6 wt% p-cymene; UQJ-1 = 90 vol.% farnesane and 10 vol.% limonene.
F
Green jet fuel fraction from distillation of crude palm oil at 160–245 °C at 20 wt% sodium carbonate.
G
Distillate of babassu biodiesel has 81.32% of C10-C15 esters composition.
H
Higher heating value.
I
Cyclopentanone/2-methylfuran derived fuel contains 68.6% of C15, 7.9% of C11-C14 and 22.9% of C10; Cyclohexanone/2-methylfuran derived fuel contains
74.3% of C16, 8.7% of C12-C15 and 16.8% of C11.
J
Used cooking oil HEFA from SkyNRG company.
K
Geranyl acetone (C13H22O) is a typical oxygen containing terpenoid.
L
Aromatic biofuel produced by the catalytic cracking of vegetable oil over HZSM-5(80) at 500 °C followed by the alkylation of aromatics with [bmim]Cl–2AlCl3 at
25 °C for 30 min; cycloparaffinics biofuel produced by the hydrogenation of aromatics over the Pd/AC catalyst at 200 °C for 6 h.
M
Cyclopentanone and furfural derived fuel contain 86.7% of C15 and 12.4% C7-C14; Cyclohexanone and 5-HMF derived fuel contain 75.4% of C18 and 22.9% of
C7-C17.
U
Unknown for whether the higher or lower heating value.

allowed for aircraft operations. The density and net heat of combustion
of bio-jet fuels were summarized and discussed in detail as follows.
5.6.1. Fuel density at 15 °C
ASTM D7566-18 specifies a density range of 730–770 kg/m3 at
15 °C for FT-SPK, HEFA, ATJ-SPK, and many studies have reported
satisfactory densities for them as presented in Table 9. Corporan et al.
[34] reported a density of 737 kg/m3 and 751 kg/m3 for FT-SPK and
HEFA respectively. ATJ-SPK had a density of 757.1 kg/m3 as reported
by Scheuermann et al. [68]. In comparison of FT-SPK, HEFA and ATJ-
SPK, the density of SIP fuel is specified to be higher but within rela-
tively narrow range between 765–780 kg/m3 in ASTM D7566-18, pre-
sumably due to its extremely high content of long chain farnesane.
Chuck and Donnelly [77] stated that pure farnesene had a density of
795 kg/m3, and 20 vol.% and 50 vol.% farnesene/Jet A-1 had a density
of 790 kg/m3 and 785 kg/m3 respectively. Although a satisfactory
density (773 kg/m3) has been reported for a SIP fuel produced by
Amyris, the density of its blend fuels were not available [68]. A density
of 778 kg/m3 was reported for SIP fuel that contains 90 vol.% of far-
nesane and 10 vol.% of limonane.
It terms of bio-jet fuels containing a relatively high amount of
aromatics, they are expected to have higher densities than that of FT-
SPK, HEFA, ATJ-SPK and SIP. For instance, a density up to 800 kg/m3 is
allowed for FT-SPK/A as specified in ASTM D7566-18, and the density
for the blend fuel or/and conventional jet fuel that have relatively high
aromatics content can range from 775 to 840 kg/m3. A density of
803 kg/m3 and 799 kg/m3 was reported for conventional Jet A-1 [31]
and JP-8 [34] respectively. ATJ-SPK/A containing 15.8 vol.% of aro-
matics and HEFA/A containing 19.7 vol.% of aromatics had a density of
785.9 kg/m3 and 805.2 kg/m3 respectively [68]. A very high density of
865 kg/m3 was reported for bio-jet fuel produced by the catalytic
cracking/aromatization of vegetable oil. Scheuermann et al. [68] used
the chemometric tool to investigate the relationship between the che-
mical composition of bio-jet fuels and their properties, and they stated
that the content of aromatics strongly influenced the density of bio-jet
fuels. These combined facts suggest that the aromatics content in bio-jet
fuels is of significance for the fuel density, and bio-jet fuel containing
relatively high amount of aromatics tends to have greater density.
In addition to the bio-jet fuels certified in ASTM D7566-18, some
attempts have been made to produce alternative jet fuels by distilling
the triglyceride-based oil or/and resulting biodiesel. These potential
bio-jet fuels alternative usually had relatively high densities as shown in
Table 9. Oliveira et al. [51] reported a density of 875 kg/m3 for the
distillate of Babassu biodiesel. Increasing the blending ratio of distillate
of palm biodiesel/Jet A-1 raised the density of blended fuel from 802 to
822 kg/m3 [76]. This is due to the fact that certain oxygen-containing
compounds were introduced into the final product during the fractional
distillation process. These existing oxygen-containing compounds led to
the hydrogen bonding formation and therefore resulted in high density
of the distillate, and to some extent, in high viscosity as well [77].
Recently, a few efforts have been made to catalytically synthesize
high-density jet fuels [70,91,71,82,88]. Han et al. [70] synthesized
branched cyclohexane (C9) as jet fuels alternative with a density of
804 kg/m3 and kinematic viscosity of 7.5 at mm2/s at −20 °C. Nie et al.
[71] produced a high-density (880 kg/m3) branched decalin (C12) as an
alternative jet fuel, unfortunately, its kinematic viscosity was not sa-
tisfactory (9.5 mm2/s > 8 mm2/s at −20 °C). Deng et al. [91] used
cyclopentanone and furfural to synthesize branched cycloalkane (C15)
via aldol condensation and HDO processes. Such generated alternative
jet fuel had a density of 815 kg/m3 but not complying with the low-
temperature fluidity required (10.8 mm2/s > 8 mm2/s at −20 °C).
Based on these three studies, it is found that the branched cycloalkane
with a relatively short carbon chain could comprise high density and
acceptable viscosity, therefore, exhibits great potential as alternative jet
fuel.
Overall, the aromatics-free FT-SPK, HEFA and ATJ-SPK usually have
relative low density than SIP, SPK/A and conventional jet fuels. The
aromatics content plays an important role for the density of bio-jet
fuels, and high aromatics content can lead to greater density for bio-jet
fuels.
5.6.2. Net heat of combustion
The net heat of combustion should be higher than 42.8 MJ/kg for
blend fuels or/and conventional jet fuels, but no such limit is specified
for synthesized hydrocarbons in ASTM D7566-18 with an exception of
SIP fuel (a minimum of 43.5 MJ/kg requirement). Brennan et al. [75]

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J. Yang et al. Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936

demonstrated that a satisfactory net heat of combustion (43.93 MJ/kg) Table 10

for SIP fuel can be obtained. Rude and Schirmer [64] presented that the Effect of aromatics on the properties of bio-jet fuels.
net heat of combustion of farnesene was 47 MJ/kg. FT-SPK and HEFA Properties Aromatics
were reported to have high net heat of combustions as well, varying
around 44 MJ/kg [34,79]. A pure FT-SPK had a net heat of combustion Low temperature fluidity
Freezing point +
of 44.1 MJ/kg, and a 50 vol.% FT-SPK/Jet A-1 blend fuel had a slightly
Kinematic viscosity −
lower net heat of combustion of 43.7 MJ/kg [30]. Lobo et al. [31] ob- Thermal oxidation stability
served a comparable decrease in net heat of combustion when blending Thermal stability −
FT-SPK with conventional jet fuel. This is because conventional jet fuel Oxidative stability +
contains certain amount of aromatics that are known to possess low net Combustion characteristics
Smoke point −
heat of combustion. The net heat of combustion is positively related to
PM and gaseous emissions −
the ratio of hydrogen to carbon (H/C ratio), and aromatics inherently DCN −
comprise relative low H/C ratio due to the presence of double bonds. Compatibility
FT-SPK usually consists of saturated hydrocarbons that have higher H/C Percent of volume swell +
*
Lubricity
ratio than aromatics. Therefore, blending FT-SPK with conventional jet
Fuel volatility
fuel decreased the net heat of combustion as compared to that of pure Distillation property −
FT-SPK. Flash point *

Noticeably, both the density and net heat of combustion of bio-jet
fuel can be significantly influenced by the content of aromatics, which
are usually heavier in mass but lower in H/C ratio than saturated hy-
drocarbons. Bi et al. [55] reported that although the cyclic alkane
biofuel (CABF; 817 kg/m3) had a lower density than that of aromatic
biofuel (ABF; 865 kg/m3), the net heat of combustion of CABF
(45.9 MJ/kg) was higher than that of ABF (42.5 MJ/kg). Blakey et al.
[126] investigated the aircraft range performance of low density/high
net heat of combustion SPK fuel in Boeing 747-200B, and they de-
monstrated that SPK fuel had comparable range performance with
conventional jet fuel (UK Avg. Jet A-1) as shown in Fig. 8.
In conclusion, the net heat of combustion of bio-jet fuels are gen-
erally satisfactory, in which are closely related to the content of aro-
matics. Relative high content of aromatics in bio-jet fuel or/and con-
ventional jet fuel tends to exhibit lower net heat of combustion.
After thoroughly investigating the above-mentioned physicochem-
ical properties, it is worthwhile to emphasize that the aromatics content
is of particular importance for bio-jet fuel performance characteristics.
Its influence on each fuel property is therefore summarized and pre-
sented in Table 10. It can be clearly observed that there are some
“trade-off” or/and interdependence among these properties. For
Fuel metering and aircraft range
Density +
Heat of combustion −
Note: “+” indicates beneficial impact; “−” indicates detrimental
impact; “*” indicates little to no impact.
instance, although the presence of aromatics has detrimental impact on
the combustion property, their existence is necessary for bio-jet fuel to
obtain satisfactory compatibility with current fueling system. There-
fore, ASTM D7566-18 regulates a minimum 8 wt% of aromatics in the
final blended jet fuels to balance relevant fuel properties and ultimately
ensure an overall satisfactory fuel performance in aviation activities.
6. Challenges and future look
The performance characteristics of bio-jet fuels are generally sa-
tisfactory, representing a promising alternative for jet fuels in a current
transition from the petroleum-based economy to a bioresource-based
economy. However, there are still several aspects that need to be ad-
dressed and thus, require further research, industrial and social efforts.
For instance, bio-jet fuels have a higher price compared to conventional

Fig. 8. The range performance of Boeing 747-200B for different fuels alternative fuels [126], in which FAME represents fatty acid methyl ester, UK Avg. is a
conventional jet fuel (Jet A-1) and SPK is synthesized paraffin kerosene.

932
J. Yang et al.
jet fuels. Cui et al. [130] reported that the use of bio-jet fuels did reduce
GHG emissions, the investment on bio-jet fuels technologies increased
the pollution abatement costs for airline companies, as the price of bio-
jet fuels was 2–3 times higher than that of petroleum kerosene. Diniz
et al. [131] also revealed that the financial performance of bio-jet fuels
(HEFA) production was mainly influenced by the price of feedstock and
conventional jet fuels. Recently, Gutiérrez-Antonio et al. [132] found
that using microalgae oil as the feedstock coupled with an intensified
hydrotreating process could result in a competitive bio-jet fuel price.
As for the government policies and efforts on the development of
bio-jet fuels, the incentives for the use of bio-jet fuels in commercial
flights could reduce bio-jet fuel price and CO2 emission tax would in-
crease conventional jet fuel price [133]. Reimer and Zheng, [134] re-
ported that in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States, the
existing low price of conventional jet fuel made camelina-based jet fuel
(HEFA) economically infeasible at present. However, if the use of HEFA
fuel aligns with the energy policy priorities of policymakers, a 17%
subside on the HEFA fuel along with a 20% tax on the conventional jet
fuels would make this bio-jet fuel supply chain economically viable.
Beyond the price of bio-jet fuels and the role of governments that play
during bio-jet fuels development, herein, we present some challenges
and recommendations from the perspective of bio-jet fuels properties in
the following sections.
6.1. Currently certified bio-jet fuels
Although the performance characteristics of FT-SPK and HEFA have
been widely studied, much less effort has been contributed for FT-SPK,
SIP and ATJ-SPK. Therefore, more research attempts need to be made to
thoroughly characterize the physicochemical properties of FT-SPK, SIP
and ATJ-SPK in future, and thus to better understand their performance
characteristics. It is also important to mention that many studies pro-
vide the general characterization information on bio-jet fuels, but the
chemical compositions of fuels are rarely available [76,77,89]. This to
some extent, limits an in-depth understanding on the relationship be-
tween fuel chemical compositions and performance characteristics. It is
thus recommended that the chemical compositions (including hydro-
carbon classes and carbon chain length) should be reported along with
the performance characteristics of bio-jet fuels.
Extremely limited information is available for some bio-jet fuel
properties in the published literature such as existent gum, water se-
paration characteristics, corrosion property and electrical conductivity
etc. Although they typically are not considered as the main aspect in
fuel performance evaluation, they are of importance as well. For in-
stance, a large amount of existent gums is indicative of fuel con-
tamination by higher boiling point oils or particulate matter and might
negatively influence the bio-jet fuel storage stability. Hence, more
emphasis and research efforts are required to characterize these prop-
erties that are rarely reported.
Moreover, although bio-jet fuels exhibit favorable combustion
properties, such as high smoke point and low PM and gaseous emissions
[30,80,97], a long-term effect of combusting bio-jet fuels or/and the
blend fuels on aviation turbine engines needs to be further evaluated.
More fundamental combustion research focusing on the soot formation
pathways, combustion species profiles, laminar flame speeds and ex-
tinction limits are recommended.
6.2. Other potential bio-jet fuels
Treating the distillate of triglyceride-based oil/resulting biodiesel as
the blending component for conventional jet fuel is still a controversial
topic. The obtained distillate usually has a relatively high density, low
net heat of combustion and poor low-temperature fluidity [49,86]. It
has been assumed that the compounds with relatively long carbon chain
length and/or containing oxygen in the distillate are responsible for
these undesirable properties. More information on the chemical
933
Fuel 237 (2019) 916–936
composition of the obtained distillate are required in future works to
better understand its performance characteristics. This will also be
beneficial when evaluating the feasibility of the distillate of trigly-
ceride-based oils/resulting biodiesel as a blending component for con-
ventional jet fuels.
Recent progress on the production of high-density bio-jet fuel focus
on a catalytic synthesis using bio-derived furfurals as feedstock via al-
kylation, aldol condensation and subsequent hydrogenation/HDO.
However, the performance characteristics for these alternatives are not
thoroughly evaluated [70,71,91]. These alternatives have very high
density due to their unique cycloalkane structures, however, this might
negatively impact their low-temperature fluidity, fuel volatility, and net
heat of combustion. The investigation on blending them with conven-
tional jet fuel are rarely conducted as well. Thus, it is essential to
evaluate the performance characteristics of both these high-density bio-
jet fuels themselves and their blends with conventional jet fuels.
7. Conclusions
An increasing demand for aviation fuels along with the growing
concern of GHG emissions have remarkably accelerated the develop-
ment of bio-jet fuels such as FT-SPK, HEFA, FT-SPK/A, SIP and ATJ-SPK
as specified in ASTM D7566-18. In this study, the performance char-
acteristics of bio-jet fuels were thoroughly assessed for the first time
based on their low-temperature fluidity, thermal oxidation stability,
combustion property, compatibility with current fueling system, fuel
volatility, and fuel metering and aircraft range.
The low-temperature fluidity of bio-jet fuels is generally satisfactory
based on two parameters, fuel freezing point and kinematic viscosity. A
high content of iso-paraffins, alkylated aromatics content, and short
chain paraffins leads to a low freezing point. SIP fuel tends to exhibit
relatively high kinematic viscosity than others due to its extremely high
content of long-chain farnesane (C15). In terms of thermal oxidation
stability, bio-jet fuels are proven to have favorable thermal stability, but
relatively poor oxidative stability compared to that of conventional jet
fuels. This is likely due to the paraffinic nature of bio-jet fuels, and the
absence of heteroatom-containing compounds and oxidatively stable
aromatics. The combustion property of bio-jet fuel is satisfactory, in-
cluding high smoke point and DCN, and low PM and gaseous emissions.
The absence of aromatics in bio-jet fuel is critical for obtaining these
desirable combustion characteristics. As for the compatibility of bio-jet
fuel with current fueling systems, bio-jet fuels are not compatible with
current fueling systems evaluated as a function of volume swell of seal
materials and lubricity. This can be attributed to a lack of aromatics and
polar compounds in bio-jet fuels. Bio-jet fuels exhibit satisfactory fuel
volatility from distillation property and flash point perspective. The
distillation property of bio-jet fuels is mainly influenced by the carbon
chain length, and the flash point could be affected by the presence of
low-boiling point aliphatic compounds and high-boiling point aromatic
compounds. The fuel metering and aircraft range of bio-jet fuel are
satisfactory as well, assessed by density and net heat of combustion. The
aromatics content plays an important role for the density and net heat
of combustion of bio-jet fuels, and a low aromatics content results in
low density but high net heat of combustion.
This review has provided a useful resource of the physicochemical
properties of bio-jet fuels to the research community, which is of critical
importance to identify more promising jet fuel alternatives. This work is
also beneficial for evaluating the overall feasibility of bio-jet fuels
production, and particularly for identifying bio-jet fuels’ properties
relevant to safe handling and stability concerns, an area that often does
not get evaluated in much detail as compared to jet fuel combustion
performance. Further research efforts should be contributed to asses-
sing the performance of recently certified bio-jet fuels SIP and ATJ-SPK
as well as rarely reported properties such as storage stability, existent
gum, and water separation characteristics.
J. Yang et al.
Acknowledgements
The authors acknowledge the financial support from MITACS
Globalink Program, Grant No. FR13684 and NSERC, Grant No. RGPIN
04211 Discovery. The authors are grateful to Xin Meng and Changlu
Zhou for their sincere assistance.
Appendix A. Supplementary data
Supplementary data to this article can be found online at https://
doi.org/10.1016/j.fuel.2018.10.079.
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