The renewable proportion of petrol is set to increase to 20 per cent over the coming years, meaning the discovery of a new production pathway for these additives could help in the fight to cut carbon dioxide emissions and tackle climate change. Engineers propose a process to generate one such additive, solketal, using waste from both biochemical and nuclear industries — termed a nuclear biorefinery.

The renewable proportion of petrol is set to increase to 20 per cent over the coming years, meaning the discovery of a new production pathway for these additives could help in the fight to cut carbon dioxide emissions and tackle climate change.

In the research paper entitled ‘Nuclear-driven production of renewable fuel additives from waste organics’, published in the science journal Communications Chemistry, engineers propose a process to generate one such additive, solketal, using waste from both biochemical and nuclear industries — termed a nuclear biorefinery.

Lancaster University PhD researcher Arran Plant said: «This research presents a new advance that utilises radiation that could, in the future, be derived from nuclear waste to produce renewable biofuel additives from biodiesel waste, which could then be used in modern petroleum fuel blends. With the renewable proportions of petroleum-derived fuels set to increase from 5 per cent to 20 per cent by 2030, fuel additives sourced this way could help address net-zero carbon emission targets.»

Malcolm Joyce, Professor of Nuclear Engineering at Lancaster University, said: «Co-generation with nuclear energy is an important area of current research, for example, using heat alongside the production of electricity. We set out to determine whether radiation might also present a similar possibility, and discovered that it can: in this case yielding a low-carbon fuel additive.»

Dr Vesna Najdanovic, an expert in biofuels from Aston University, and previously at Lancaster University, said: «I am so excited about our work as it reveals a new method for processing wastes from biodiesel industry using spent nuclear energy. This green technology will pave the pathway to use waste as a resource to produce valuable chemicals and biofuels.»

Reliable, low-carbon energy from nuclear or biofuels is integral to many strategies to reduce carbon emissions, however nuclear plants have high upfront costs and the manufacture of biodiesel produces waste glycerol, which has few secondary uses.

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