India’s first biofuel-driven flight successfully takes off; hints at cheaper, greener travel

In an attempt to go green and reduce the cost of air travel, a 72-seater SpiceJet aircraft powered by biofuel (partially) successfully took off from the Jolly Grant Airport at Dehradun and landed at the Delhi Airport this Monday. The flagging off ceremony was done by the Chief Minister of Uttarakhand, Trivendra Singh Rawat.
As per an SpiceJet official, the biofuel used for the flight is partially made from different renewable resources including agricultural wastes, non-edible oils, and municipal wastes to mention a few. When it comes to pros of using biofuel, it can immediately reduce the cost of overall operations and also make air travel cleaner. This entire process will reduce the dependency of flight operations on aviation turbine fuel.

The biofuel for the trial was developed by CSIR-Indian Institute of Petroleum in Dehradun and was tested rigorously before going for trial on the final day. Quite interestingly, around 500 farmer families from Chhattisgarh were also involved in the making of biofuel. These people were involved in the process of production of partially-refined biofuel, which uses oil extracted from the seeds of a plant called Jatropha.
The 25-minutes SpiceJet Bombardier Q400 plane had 20 people onboard, including officials from the DGCA and SpiceJet. At the Delhi Airport, Union Ministers Nitin Gadkari, Suresh Prabhu, Dharmendra Pradhan, Dr Harsh Vardhan and Jayant Sinha were present at the time of landing.

With this big success, the government is now planning an environment-friendly aviation action plan till 2035.