The first meeting of the Eliminate Aviation Gasoline Lead Emissions (EAGLE) in early March 2022 narrowed the committee’s task to one simple statement:
Find an unleaded alternative to 100LL by 2030 that does not compromise safety and works for all general aviation piston aircraft.
They intend to achieve this mission by 2030.
According to Earl Lawerence, executive director of the FAA’s Aircraft Certification Service, the initiative faces multiple challenges. These include the many general aviation aircraft that are 50 years or older, and the number of times an unleaded fuel solves one problem only to create another.
As EAGLE partners government and industry leaders together to address the issue, general aviation leaders like AOPA identified unleaded avgas as one of the most pressing needs in the industry. The EPA in January announced plans to regulate lead emissions from piston-engine aircraft with a final decision scheduled for 2022. This announcement added urgency to the quest for unleaded avgas.
In an AOPA-hosted webinar in March, the organization emphasized the importance of partnering with the FAA on this initiative. As a government entity, the FAA has a better opportunity to communicate with the EPA about the industry’s plans for unleaded fuel.
The initiative plans to use lessons learned from the FAA’s Piston Aviation Fuels Initiative (PAFI). While this initiative did not achieve the desired results, it does offer lessons the organization believes will be important in developing unleaded avgas that works for all piston aircraft.
We’re keeping our eyes on this process as it moves forward. The Initiative will meet again in a few months. We’ll provide more updates as they become available.
