IAF plans to fly AN-32 with blend of bio-fuel on R-Day

Ajay Banerjee

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, August 19

In an effort to go ‘green’, the Indian Air Force intends to fly planes using a blend of bio-fuel with aviation turbine fuel (ATF).

The plan is to fly AN-32 — a transport plane — over the Rajpath at the forthcoming Republic Day parade in January 2019, says the August 2018 ‘issue brief’ of the IAF-backed think-tank, the Centre for Air Power Studies (CAPS).

The move could reduce the import bill of oil and in turn augment farm incomes in India, says Wing Commander Asheesh Srivastava, a research fellow at CAPS, in the ‘issue brief’ that has been put in public domain on the website of the CAPS.

IAF Chief Air Chief Marshal BS Dhanoa while addressing an industry seminar on ‘Technology infusion and indigenisation plans of the IAF’ held last month spoke about the IAF’s effort in joining hands with various institutes for this purpose.

The Air Chief has offered IAF’s aircraft and entire range of in-house testing facilities along with financial support to the project under the IAF’s indigenisation (R&D) fund.

The fuel will need to be tested and validated using the expertise of the Indian Institute of Petroleum (IIP), Dehradun, Defence Research and Development Organisation’s Centre for Military Airworthiness & Certification and Directorate General of Aeronautical Quality Assurance.

Once proven, the technology can be commercialised across the country to augment farmers’ income. Farm waste and few more forest products may soon have to be re-classified as ‘cash crops’ in lieu of ‘non-edible waste’ and could herald a new era in economics of the Indian aviation industry, which aligns with the Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision on biofuels, argues the CAPS paper.

The IAF and Indian aviation industry would join the select group of nations who have flown military and commercial aircraft on indigenous bio-jet fuel.

The ultimate aim is to fly fighter aircraft with bio-jet fuel just as the United States Air Force (USAF) did in 2010, the difference being that unlike the US case, the fuel would be sourced from non-food produce, harvested from non-agriculture land holdings.

Bio-fuel planned to be produced in India is sourced from non-edible vegetable oil, therefore, negating the ‘Food vs Fuel’ debate.

Going ‘green’ 

• The Air Chief has offered IAF’s aircraft and entire range of in-house testing facilities along with financial support to the project under the IAF’s indigenisation (R&D) fund
• Once proven, the technology can be commercialised across the country to augment farmers’ income.