Rio Tinto completes first biofuel trial in Australia

Rio Tinto (ASX, LON: RIO) announced Wednesday it has successfully completed the group’s first biofuel trial across its network of ports, railways and mines in Western Australia as it looks to decarbonize its iron ore operations.The trial, which ran for four weeks from January to February, was conducted in partnership with Finland-based renewable diesel producer Neste and Australian fuel supplier Viva Energy.For the trial, Neste allocated 10 million litres of renewable diesel from used cooking oil. The fuel was shipped from Singapore to the Parker Point fuel terminal in Dampier by Viva Energy and blended portside with fossil diesel to create a mix with about 20% renewable diesel. It was then distributed across Rio Tinto’s Pilbara iron ore operations for use in rail, marine, blasting, haul trucks, surface mining equipment and light vehicles.The trial provided an understanding of how renewable diesel use could be scaled up across Rio Tinto’s Australian operations in the future, giving key insights into the bulk renewable diesel supply chain, importation and blending processes, Rio Tinto stated.The trial also reduced Rio Tinto’s Scope 1 emissions by about 27,000 tonnes of direct greenhouse gas emissions, which is as much as the tailpipe emissions from 6,300 cars for a year, it added.“Diesel makes up about 70% of the total carbon emissions from our Pilbara iron ore operations. While electrification is the ultimate longer-term solution for repowering the majority of our fleet, we’re also exploring biofuels as a complementary and nearer-term solution,” Richard Cohen, Rio Tinto’s managing director of rail, port and core services, commented.“Through this trial with Neste and Viva Energy, we’ve gained valuable insights into how renewable diesel can help bridge the gap to widespread electrification as well as for circumstances where electrification may not be suitable.”Rio Tinto is actively exploring the potential of biofuels as part of its ongoing efforts to achieve its Scope 1 and 2 emissions reduction targets of 50% by 2030 and net zero by 2050. This trial builds on the successful transition at the company’s Boron and Kennecott operations in the US, where 11% of its total global fossil diesel consumption has been replaced with renewable diesel.The world’s largest iron ore miner is also developing a Pongamia seed farm in North Queensland as part of a biofuels pilot to contribute to the growth of the Australian biofuels industry.Weiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei Mining.com Weiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei Mining.com