Money talks, goes the standard street wisdom, and [expletive of choice] walks. That more than anything describes the state of play when comparing the alternative jet fuel industry to the rather more stalled effort to find an unleaded replacement for 100LL. This should be no surprise. Thanks to serious industry support from the military, turbine engine manufacturers, the airlines and even the FAA, the alternative jet fuel industry is on a virtual gallop to have in place the regulatory approval standards to allow use of bio-derived or synthetic jet fuels by next year or at least 2012. The economics remain untested so far, but the regulatory hurdles havent proven as difficult or at least as time-consuming as they have for finding a 100LL replacement. Is there a lesson here? 
Big Money
Two forces are pushing the alternative jet fuel market-petroleum price volatility and related worries about peak oil and concern about emissions, mostly carbon dioxide. National security concerns-an always-reliable means of priming the money pump-are a third factor, thus the U.S. Air Forces interest in alternative fuels has lent a credibility and urgency to the project that has no current equivalent on the aviation gasoline side.
Further, the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 requires federal agencies to buy only fuel that has equivalent or lower life cycle carbon emissions as current petroleum fuels. The Air Force is hoping bio-based or synthetic fuels will help with that and the airlines are equally concerned about carbon footprints.
To make all this happen-which it has with remarkable speed-the industry formed the Commercial Aviation Alternative Fuels Initiative (CAAFI), a working group consisting of FAA staff and representatives from the engine and commercial aircraft manufacturers, with help from the budding alternative fuels segment. On the avgas side, the rough equivalent of this is the Coordinating Research Council, a non-profit council composed of petroleum and automotive technical representatives. The CRC has had a standing committee examining avgas replacements for years, but it hasnt produced much of substance. Its recent report was largely a summary of past findings and a restatement of the challenge.
Neither CRC nor CAAFI are actually responsible for developing fuels, but rather greasing the skids to get consensus specifications developed and approved so industry can attract capital to produce the fuels.