Linde and Shell support development of alternative aviation fuels

With Linde AG and Deutsche Shell Holding GmbH two Global Players are committing themselves to support the market introduction of sustainable alternative aviation fuels. By their joining aireg, the initiative with now 31 members is gaining further competence, especially in the fields of refining, distribution and quality assurance.

Siegfried Knecht, Chairman of aireg, is enthusiastic about this development: “aireg is gaining further clout through the participation of Linde and Shell. We can now demonstrate even better that alternative aviation fuels are fully capable of being integrated in the existing infrastructure and that the required 2nd generation biorefineries can be realised by German Engineering.”

The Linde Group is a world-leading gases and engineering company with around 50,500 employees in more than 100 countries worldwide. In the 2011 financial year, it generated revenue of EUR 13.787 bn. The company possesses extensive know-how along the entire hydrogen value chain, spanning from production to refuelling. Linde is also partnering with other enterprises to develop and commercialize biofuels from algae. Since 2011, Linde co-operates with Sapphire Energy in order to develop an inexpensive CO2 procurement system for industrial-sized open pond algae cultivating systems for the production of biofuels that are able to substitute fossil jet fuel.

Deutsche Shell Holding is a daughter of Royal Dutch plc, which is headquartered in Den Haag, Netherlands. The Shell Group with approx. 90,000 employees is active in more than 90 countries. Its business activity consists of exploration and extraction of oil and gas, the production and marketing of liquefied natural gas and the liquefaction of gas; the production, marketing and transport of oil products and chemicals as well as renewable energy projects. Shell is the largest marketer of first generation biofuels and leading in research and development of second generation biofuels. Shell is convinced that in the mid-term sustainable alternative fuels have the highest potential to lowering the transport sector’s CO2 emissions.