TECHNOLOGY being developed by Queensland researchers to turn agricultural waste such as bagasse from sugarcane into biofuels, has captured the interest of the US Navy, which is in Australia on a fact-finding mission on biofuels.

The US Navy intends to have a fleet of warships known as the Great Green Fleet running on biofuels by 2016 and by 2020 it plans to run half of its entire fleet on alternative fuels.

Discussing biofuel technology being developed by Queensland University of Technology (QUT) researchers was on the agenda this week when the US Navy's director for operational energy, Chris Tindal, met on Monday with QUT's Professor Sagadevan Mundree and Dr Ian O'Hara to learn more about the capabilities of QUT's Mackay Renewable Biocommodities Pilot Plant.

The meeting was followed up on Tuesday with a tour of the pilot plant in Mackay.

QUT professor Sagadevan Mun-dree said the US Navy was meeting Queensland institutions involved in research and development that could deliver the technology to industry partners, who would ultimately supply these fuels on a commercial scale.

"QUT is the only institution in Australia with the capability of dem-onstrating a diverse range of waste to biofuel technologies at the pilot scale," Professor Mundree said.

"The pilot plant has now been operational for over 14 months, so Mr Tindal is here to find out more about how the technology is progressing.

"The pilot plant is unique in that most biofuel research and development in Australia is taking place at a lab-scale level.

"However, we have the opportunity of taking biofuel technology from the concept stage to the pilot stage in a very short space of time."

Prof Mundree said the US Navy said it required 80,000 barrels of biofuel for the Green Fleet in 2016.

"We have considerable capability to develop technologies that could potentially be delivered by industry partners to satisfy a significant portion of that requirement," he said.

Researchers at the pilot plant are already working with Australian and international industry partners to develop and demonstrate technology to turn agricultural waste, such as bagasse from sugarcane, into biofuels.

"We have also partnered with a Queensland company which is developing biodiesel technologies, and we are assisting them in the demonstration of these products in the pilot plant. So far we have produced several thousand litres of biodiesel from waste agricultural oils," Prof Mundree said.

The pilot plant has been funded by the Federal Government through the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy and the Education Investment Fund, the Queensland Government's Smart State Research Facilities Fund, and QUT with the support of Mackay Sugar Ltd.

QUT's industry partners in this project include the large global agri-business Syngenta, Leaf Energy, The Biofuels Partnership and Mackay Sugar Ltd.

Minister for Agriculture, Tim Mulherin and Mackay Sugar hosted the US Navy delegation on Tuesday.

"Queensland has an opportunity to capture the interest of the US Navy with its biofuels technology development," Mr Mulherin said.

"Queensland is a big sugar producer and the state is well placed with a number of research institutions working in the biofuels area.

"There is an opportunity for Queensland to lead the way working with the US Navy in the development of next stage (demonstration-scale) commercial production of biofuels."

The US Navy also met biofuels researchers and industry leaders at the Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology at the University of Queensland in Brisbane this week.

University of Queensland vice-chancellor, Professor Deborah Terry, said Mr Tindal's visit to Queensland was a credit to local researchers who were making advances in areas including new-generation 'drop-in' biofuels.

Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology (AIBN) business manager for systems and synthetic biology, Dr Robert Speight, said the aviation fuel research had a clear focus on "delivering real benefits to Queensland".

"Microbial fermentation is used to turn sucrose from sugarcane into advanced biofuel," he said.

Researchers are applying systems and synthetic biology to improve microbes and assess the technical and economic potential of the technology in Queensland.

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US Navy eyes Aussie biofuel research