Switch in Jet Fuel is Saving the Air Force Millions

Changing the type of jet fuel the Air Force uses for its aircraft has lowered the price by two cents a gallon. That doesn’t sound like much, but when that is applied to the billions of gallons consumed annually, the switch is saving USAF millions of dollars a year, according to an Air Mobility Command release. Travis AFB, Calif., the Air Force’s second largest jet fuel consumer, recently made the switch from JP-8, which is refined to meet military specifications, to Jet A fuel, a widely available, less expensive commercial variant. The AMC hub expects the change to save it more than $1 million a year. Since beginning the jet fuel transition in June 2011, the Air Force has saved an estimated $15 million, said SSgt. Lee’Etta Norman, 60th Logistics Readiness Squadron fuels service center accountant. As of Aug. 8, 80 percent of the Air Force’s CONUS bases have made the switch and are expected to hit 100 percent by November, Norman said. JP-8 and Jet A have the same density range, energy content, and flash point, so the switch has not had any maintenance or operational impact. JP-8 does have a lower freezing point, minus 47 degrees Celsius versus 40 degrees for Jet A.