The US Air Force Academy has partnered with the Air Force Research Lab and Cool Clean Technologies, Inc., an Eagan, Minn., company to help develop methods to produce biofuels based on algae oil. “These partnerships provide another superb research thrust for our cadets and the Air Force Academy in an exciting new technology,” said Don Veverka, director of the academy’s Environmental Research Center. Cadets from various disciplines will participate, including involvement in a potential pilot-scale production facility. Academy officials are also in talks with a researcher from Brooklyn University, N.Y., on cooperative research that would entail further investigation of additional algae strains as biofuels. (USAFA release)
The Air Force and Boeing agreed to a nearly $2.4 billion contract for a new lot of KC-46 aerial tankers on Nov. 21. The deal, announced by the Pentagon, is for 15 new aircraft in Lot 11 at a cost of $2.389 billion—some $159 million per tail.