Techno-economic assessment of different aviation fuel supply pathways including LH2 and LCH4 and the influence of the carbon source

Abstract

Sustainable Jet A-1 and radical technological changes are required to decrease the CO2 emissions of the aviation industry. While the CO2 reduction potential of electric aircraft is limited, the implementation of LH2 and LCH4 are exemplary radical technological changes with large potential impact. Recent studies have evaluated conceptual designs for planes utilizing LH2 and LCH4. Also, the costs of sustainable Jet A-1 and green hydrogen have been evaluated in different studies. However, most studies focus on one fuel and its production costs and do not include the production at a sweet spot and the subsequent logistic to the destination. To address this issue and present novel research results, we conducted a holistic techno-economic assessment for the different fuels that could be implemented in the aviation industry; LH2, LCH4 and sustainable Jet A-1. Based on renewable hydrogen produced in Morocco, we compared the aspects of a local fuel synthesis with the synthesis in Germany. CO2 is supplied from ambient air in Morocco and from a local point source in Germany. For the latter, we considered a hydrogen transport via LH2 or LOHC, with a direct integration of the LOHC dehydrogenation into the fuel synthesis plant. We outlined the cost composition of every fuel supply chain and retrieved LH2 import costs of 157 €/MWh while the cost range for LCH4 is 217–228 €/MWh. SAF has the highest net production costs of 279–302 €/MWh.