It seems like you can power pretty much anything on natural gas or propane, why not jet engines or at least prop planes? Is it a weight issue?
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Space and weight.
Planes typically carry fuel in wing tanks, the skin of the wings is actually the tank.
CNG must be stored in heavy pressure tanks. Not only would the tanks be hugely more heavy, but they would take up far more space since they have to be round in order to hold the pressure.
Weight. The tanks holding CNG have a withstand a lot more force than those holding standard aviation fuel. That means they have to be larger and heavier, which is makes it very hard to incorporate into aircraft designs.
Two words. Energy Density. Natural gas needs to be compressed and even then it still is not as dense as “Jet-A” fuel.
The power generated by the fuel is less for the volume, ideally for an airplane fuel you want a very dense fuel otherwise you are using a lot of fuel just to transport the fuel.
I think it’s a safety issue. Aren’t those fuel types a lot more explosive?
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