100 Octane Coalition: No Excuse For Slow Moving Fuel Progress
A recently formed grassroots coalition to press the FAA and industry groups forward met with high-level FAA officials Monday and delivered an unambiguous message: Any new fuel under consideration to replace avgas should be of at least the equivalent of 100 octane and to make that happen, the FAA needs to clarify the fuel certification rules and level the playing field. Jon Sisk, who’s president of the Malibu/Mirage Owners Association and also a principal in the Clean 100-Octane coalition, described the meeting with agency officials as positive and encouraging. But he urged the FAA to assume its rightful role in clarifying the fuel certification process and he explained that the coalition’s position is that while the alphabets and the industry’s FAST fuels group have an appropriate role, developing fuels and setting the certification rules for them to be approved isn’t one of them.
A recently formed grassroots coalition to press the FAA and industry groups forward met with high-level FAA officials Monday and delivered an unambiguous message: Any new fuel under consideration to replace avgas should be of at least the equivalent of 100 octane and to make that happen, the FAA needs to clarify the fuel certification rules and level the playing field. Jon Sisk, who's president of the Malibu/Mirage Owners Association and also a principal in the Clean 100-Octane coalition, described the meeting with agency officials as positive and encouraging. But he urged the FAA to assume its rightful role in clarifying the fuel certification process and he explained that the coalition's position is that while the alphabets and the industry's FAST fuels group have an appropriate role, developing fuels and setting the certification rules for them to be approved isn't one of them.
"We want to make sure the FAA is creating an environment where the innovators -- the people who are actually going to come up with the fuels -- understand the process they're going to have to go through to get these fuels approved. People are not going to expend the capital to do these things if the rules aren't clear and the playing field is not level."
Sisk further said there's no excuse for not doing what needs to be done now to speed this process along. He described yesterday's confusing statement by the EPA that it has no authority to regulate aviation fuels as a dangerous distraction.
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