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A powerful military jet fuel normally made from coal tar can now be made more cheaply from plants.

Researchers at the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics in China have come up with a way of producing the superfuel 鈥� known as JP-10 鈥� from a chemical called furfuryl alcohol that is extracted from plant waste like sugar cane residue, cotton stalks, and forestry off-cuts.

The six-step process converts furfuryl alcohol to the superfuel using a series of catalysts and temperatures of up to 250 degrees Celsius.

JP-10 is a sought-after fuel because it has good thermal stability, a low freezing point, and a high density that means a small volume can propel aircraft a long way. But it costs $7000 per tonne, which is more than 10 times pricier than ordinary jet fuel used in commercial planes. This has limited its uses to missiles and speciality military aircraft like聽hypersonic jets.

The new way of making JP-10 from green waste brings the cost down to $5000 per tonne. The price could soon drop further to $2500 per tonne as new technologies make it easier to extract furfuryl alcohol from plant matter, the researchers write.

This would still make it about 4 times more expensive than commercial jet fuel, but the reduced cost could expand its military uses, they say.

Green flight

Making JP-10 from green waste should be more environmentally-friendly than the usual way of making it from coal tar, says at the Queensland University of Technology in Australia. 鈥淔uels from bio-based sources tend to have significant greenhouse gas reductions compared to conventional fossil fuels,鈥� he says.

There is increasing interest in using plant-based biofuels to cut the carbon footprint of aviation, says O鈥橦ara. In contrast to cars, it鈥檚 hard to make planes electric, he says. 鈥淚n aviation, there are very few alternatives to liquid fuel,鈥� he says.

Biofuels are also good for energy security because they can be grown at home, says O鈥橦ara. In 2016, for example, the US military started using biofuel made from beef fat in its 鈥淕reat Green Fleet鈥� of warships and aircraft, in a move that then-Navy Secretary Ray Mabus said would unleash America from 鈥渢he tether of foreign oil鈥�.