Foundation of REDIFUEL project

Foundation of the REDIFUEL project:

The EU target for 2050 is to bring down the GHG emissions to only 5-20% of the 1990 levels which is crucial to lower the impact of global warming and climate change. The road transport sector, which represents 95% of the EU’s 2016 total of transport GHG emissions1, should take its share and needs to contribute with at least a 60% decrease in its GHG emissions2. This represents a major challenge for the road transport sector, as the sector is nearly entirely based on internal combustion engines (ICE), using fossil fuels.

Besides electrifying short range transport of people and goods, it is clear that the ultimate solution is to fully switch the remaining transport to 2nd or 3rd generation biofuels and efficient powertrains that comply with fuel economy targets as well as current and future emission standards. Furthermore, the ultimate solution has to enable a fluent transition from dominantly fossil-based fuels to 2nd or 3rd generation biofuels in existing and future powertrains and without or with a minimum need for infrastructure changes and investments in the logistic chain.

This means that drop-in capable renewable fuel solutions are needed, which can be mixed in any quantity and ratio with fossil-based fuel and which comply with current and future fuel standards, i.e. EN228 for gasoline and EN590 for diesel. Furthermore, the drop-in renewable fuel solutions have to be cost competitive compared to existing fossil fuels and they have to be versatile in feedstock and producible in large volumes and year-round. This allows for a swift market introduction and a fluent transition from fossil-based fuels to biofuels.