New fuel startup unveils rocket and jet fuels that it says are as much as 32% more efficient
A new startup, CycloKinetics, has announced a product line of chemically engineered rocket and jet fuels that it says are as much as 32% more efficient that standard fuels.
CycloKinetics’ approach is to create “plug-in” fuels that can replace conventional fuels in various vehicles without requiring modifications to the craft or its engines. There’s nothing particularly wild or exotic about this, and no unobtanium-type elements are involved. It’s more a matter of changing the geometry of the hydrocarbon molecules that make up the fuel itself.
Conventional aviation fuels consist of linear and branched hydrocarbon molecules, which limits how much energy can be packed into a given volume. CycloKinetics instead engineers cycloparaffinic hydrocarbons – that is, ring-shaped molecular structures that pack more carbon and hydrogen atoms into the same space as would be occupied by conventional fuels.
The upshot is 32% more energy in the same volume as standard Jet A fuel. That means, for example, an aircraft capable of flying 1,500 nautical miles (1,726 miles, 2,778 km) on standard fuel could potentially exceed 1,950 nautical miles (2,244 miles, 3,611 km) using the new superfuel, while reconnaissance aircraft could remain on station up to 30% longer.
The company is also selling its version of RP-1, the kerosene fuel used for example by SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket.
It remains unclear whether it will be cost effective for rocket or airline companies to consider buying this fuel. For one, the extra cost to make it might outweigh the fuel savings. For another, it is unclear the company will be able to produce enough to meet the market. Nonetheless, the concept is intriguing, and could pay-off for this startup in the long run.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Very interesting.
Sounds like something the military would pay more for even if the private sector won’t.
Being somewhat familiar with the decades-long, and still unsuccessful, efforts to replace 100LL aviation gasoline… I’m skeptical.
To paraphrase that old DuPont motto – better things for better living through geometry.
Imagine all cars millage going up 25%.
Ecoists should be investing everything in this and then promoting it.
1.Remember the sainted Bob Heinlein’s TANSTAAFL – There Aint No Such Thing As A Free Lunch
1A. What are the processing costs?
1B. What are the long term effects on non-one shot propulsion systems – like locomotives, trucks, cars, ships, etc
From the New Atlas article:
It is aimed at the military market.
If I understand correctly, the “increased” energy comes from a higher mass density of the fuel. This does not affect rockets in quite the way as the article leads us to believe. If the same volume of fuel is used, then the total weight of the rocket is greater, and the rocket may not get off the launch pad. Less volume of fuel would have to be used. The fuel will have to still weigh the same, but the rocket fuselage could possibly be 25% shorter, saving a portion of the structural weight in a way similar SpacX’s design of using colder propellants in order to increase their density. Being able to use a lighter structure helps fight the tyranny of the rocket equation, so there is an advantage to using a denser fuel, but it may not be the advantage suggested by the article.
They suggest that there is less “coking,” deposits of carbon that clog rocket parts and make reusability harder for fuel-rich hydrocarbon engines. This could be an advantage for future rocket designs.
Airplanes would be unlikely to carry more cargo, as the fuel would weigh the same for the same distance, it would only take up less volume in the tanks. If they fill the tanks full, then they can get more distance, but the payload would have to be less in order for the airplane to get airborne.
Fortunately, the CycloKinetics press release does not make numerical claims and may stick more to reality.
We will have to see how this fuel measures up when analyzed by the rocket companies.
I am currently reading the book Ignition, and in the early days there were plenty of engineers trying not to kill themselves finding fuel and oxidizer mixtures that work reliably, smoothly, and store well. It seems that a few scientists and engineers killed themselves before everyone realized that they had to actively try not to.
My point — which I seem to be annoyingly taking my time getting to and which is probably not worth reading, much less reading all this nonsense — is that there really was at least one secret super rocket fuel, but as far as I have read, no dastardly villains in costumes kidnapped any scientists or engineers.
Zip propellants like pentaborane?
I think there is a site called “chemicals I won’t work with.”
There has been progress with boron:
https://phys.org/news/2026-05-chemists-isolate-boronoxygen-molecule.html#goog_rewarded
Borazon (cBN) is as hard as diamond but with a much higher melting point. I want to see hulls with that stuff.
Hackaday had an article called “How to make steels that breathes” that makes me wonder if it might be of use in transpiration cooling. Maybe Borazon could be made similar.
Jeff Wright,
Yes, you are a dreamer. You look for every optimization except for cost optimizations. Engineers tried this for seven decades and it is one of the reasons that SLS is such a failure. It is more important for space to be affordable than to put huge masses into space on each launch. If it costs too much, then few people will want to do things in space.
SpaceX, Rocket Lab, and Stoke Space are all working on cost optimization, and it is only because access to space has become less expensive that we are seeing progress in the use of space as an asset.
You keep linking to articles about new science and concepts that may improve performance as though they are ready for prime time and rocket scientists should incorporated them immediately, but they have not yet passed the proof of concept phase of development for the uses you want them employed to do. They may be interesting, but they are not yet practical.