Navy Pushes Biofuel Fleet Despite Concerns About Damage to Equipment

The U.S. military is touting biofuels as a way to sever itself from diesel and other fossil fuels. While the high cost of biofuel purchases is a major roadblock to the Navy’s “Green Fleet” plans, as Scribe documented on Monday, some observers have noted a more fundamental — and troubling — problem. Biofuels may actually damage military equipment. Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus plans to use a 50-50 blend of conventional fuels and biofuels for his “Great Green Fleet,” a Carrier Strike Group composed of a destroyer, tanker and an aircraft carrier that are fueled by alternative energy sources. Mabus plans to have half the Navy fleet on alternative fuels by 2020. While congressional leaders, including Rep. Mike Conaway (R-TX), have balked at the high costs of biofuels at almost $27 per gallon for 450,000 gallons, other observers note the other problem: potential damage that biofuels could do to the machinery it powers. Rice University professor Pedro Alvarez examined the unintended consequences that might result from large-scale production and use of bioenergy in the United States, particularly ethanol, in a January 2010 study that he co-authored. The study concluded that there needs to be greater knowledge about the long-term effects of bioenergy before large-scale implementation. “The overall effect of using biofuels to power maritime vessels,” Alvarez told Scribe, “is high potential for corrosion on their tanks” due to high levels of bacteria in those fuels. Jason S. Lee, an engineer at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, also warned of the potential for corrosion. “Susceptibility of biodiesel to … biodegradation and its propensity to stimulate biocorrosion suggest caution when integrating this alternate fuel with the existing infrastructure,” he found in a 2010 study conducted by the University of Oklahoma and the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory on the impact of biodiesel on metal. “The blending of biodiesel with traditional diesel resulted in the first known demonstration of localized corrosion of aluminum in the fuel layer itself,” he later told Corr Defense...more