Carbon-neutral fuel is fuel which produces no net-greenhouse gas emissions or carbon footprint. In practice, this usually means fuels that are made using carbon dioxide (CO) as a feedstock. Proposed carbon-neutral fuels can broadly be grouped into synthetic fuels, which are made by chemically hydrogenating carbon dioxide, and biofuels, which are produced using natural CO-consuming processes like photosynthesis.
The carbon dioxide used to make synthetic fuels may be directly captured from the air, recycled from power plant flue exhaust gas or derived from carbonic acid in seawater. Common examples of synthetic fuels include ammonia and methane, although more complex hydrocarbons such as gasoline and jet fuel have also been successfully synthesized artificially. In addition to being carbon neutral, such renewable fuels can alleviate the costs and dependency issues of imported fossil fuels without requiring either electrification of the vehicle fleet or conversion to hydrogen or other fuels, enabling continued compatible and affordable vehicles. In order to be truly carbon-neutral, any energy required for the process must be itself be carbon-neutral or emissions-free, like renewable energy or nuclear energy.
If the combustion of carbon-neutral fuels is subject to carbon capture at the flue, they result in net-negative carbon dioxide emission and may thus constitute a form of greenhouse gas remediation. Negative emissions are widely considered an indispensable component of efforts to limit global warming, although negative emissions technologies are currently not economically viable for private sector companies. Carbon credits are likely to play an important role for carbon-negative fuels.