While the long-awaited unleaded replacement for 100LL might not quite be ready for the fuel farm, as of early December 2013, it looked to be at least hovering over the horizon. Shell surprised the industry with a late-in-the-year announcement that it has developed an unleaded 100-octane fuel that it intends to submit to the FAA’s fuel approval process.
Shell becomes the first major oil company to submit a candidate fuel, joining two other fuels to be submitted by General Aviation Modifications, Inc. and Swift Fuel, both of whom are we’ll along in their testing of 100LL replacements. Shell’s surprise announcement was believed to be timed to coincide with ASTM International’s meeting in Tampa in early December.