ABSTRACT
For engineers and scientists who are new to the field of biofuel production for aviation, it can be bewildering to come to termswith the conflicting conclusions drawn in the literature or evaluate the claims found in a casual web search. It is a multidisciplinary field that spans chemical, petroleum, environmental, mechanical, aerospace, materials and industrial engineering. The field is also overlaid by a web of geographically varying public policies that profoundly impact economic feasibility and the pace and directions in technology development. It is a field that has grown rapidly in all of these areas, so that there is a vast, rich literature base to peruse. Finally, there are passionate and articulate advocates for every conceivable side. This can make the leap across the interdisciplinary aspects rather challenging. Some of the most embedded sources of confusion arise from the following:
• Terminologymaybe conflictingor otherwise difficult to understand. For example, the namingof the same set of hydrocarbon compounds in petroleum engineering differs from the conventions in organic chemistry.
