Changi powers ahead with renewable diesel

Photo: Changi Airport Group

As part of its net-zero emissions goal, Singapore has a vision for all vehicles to run on cleaner energy by 2040.

Aligned with this green vision, Changi Airport Group is also working with the airport community to enable the transition of airside vehicles to cleaner energy variants.

Today, Changi Airport is already operating with a fully electric fleet of baggage tractors.

While electric variants are available for light vehicles, forklifts and tractors, most other heavy vehicles and specialized equipment specific to the aviation industry are still diesel-powered, such as airport-runway sweepers and runway rubber-removal vehicles.

Since May, CAG has embarked on a renewable diesel trial to evaluate if this can be an effective complement to electrification.

As part of the circularity loop for the renewable diesel trial, CAG worked with its vendors and tenants to collect used cooking oil (UCO) from food-and-beverage outlets at Changi Airport.

These contribute towards the feedstock to produce the renewable diesel used in the trial.

The collected UCO is eventually transported to Neste’s Singapore refinery where, using advanced refining technologies, the collected feedstock is converted into high-quality renewable diesel fuel with a similar chemical composition to fossil diesel.

In May, CAG began its trial with a 50 percent renewable diesel blend, which has been upped to 100 percent during the second phase of the trial, which started in mid-August.

Over at Neste, a wide variety of globally sourced renewable raw materials is used to produce Neste MY Renewable Diesel. 

Neste only accepts sustainably sourced renewable raw materials from traceable sources and works closely with its carefully selected suppliers to ensure sustainable supply chains.

For CAG, the trial specifies the type of renewable diesel that is sourced from UCO, as it embeds circularity principles of using waste oil to fuel its vehicles.

This approach is also aligned to CAG’s environmental strategy.

When CAG’s trial progressed to 100 percent renewable diesel, it can achieve up to 90 percent less greenhouse-gas (GHG or CO2e) emissions over the fuel’s lifecycle when compared to fossil diesel. 

“The heavy vehicles and specialized mobile equipment selected to participate in this trial have been observed to perform well on the 50 percent renewable diesel blend without any impact to vehicle operations and efficiency,” said Gerald Ng, CAG’s vice president of regulatory affairs and sustainability. “We look forward to the next phase of trialing 100 percent renewable diesel and to explore long-term decarbonization options for CAG.”