US sustainable aviation fuel production startup DG Fuels has selected Fischer-Tropsch (FT) technology co-developed by Johnson Matthey and energy giant bp for its proposed $4 billion SAF plant near the Mississippi River in Louisiana. Subject to approval being received this year, the St. James Parish facility could be in operation by 2028 and would be the largest announced FT SAF production operation in the world, says DG Fuels, with a planned capacity of 13,000 barrels per day, or around 120-135 million gallons of SAF annually. The FT CANS technology is feedstock agnostic although the facility will use plant waste, primarily sugar cane bagasse. Meanwhile, Southwest Airlines has acquired SAFFiRE Renewables, which is utilising technology developed at the Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory to convert corn stover, a widely available agricultural residue feedstock in the US, into renewable ethanol. SAFFiRE is now expected to proceed with developing a pilot plant in Kansas to produce ethanol for conversion into SAF by LanzaJet.

Commenting on its collaboration with Johnson Matthey and bp, DG Fuels’ CEO Michael Darcy said: “Using their co-developed FT CANS technology allows DG Fuels to scale SAF at high volume production and competitive prices for the first time ever. This innovation will take our SAF from the sugar cane fields of Louisiana to cleaner skies all across the world.”

DG Fuels has already secured offtake purchase deals with Delta Air Lines and Air France-KLM, and has a strategic partnership with Airbus to scale up the use of SAF globally. Last November, Air France announced it was investing $4.7 million in the company and the Air France-KLM group acquired an option to purchase up to 25 million gallons (75,000 tons) of SAF annually over a multi-year period beginning in 2029 from the Louisiana plant and a second facility planned in Maine. This is on top of a 2022 offtake agreement by the group for 600,000 tons of SAF from DG Fuels, to be delivered over ten years.

For its first project, the company has earmarked a 3,000-acre (1,200ha) site on the West Bank of St. James Parish for potential development of the near $4bn facility. It says the project is anticipated to create 650 direct permanent jobs, with preference given to local residents and promises to address local needs while protecting the environment and promoting economic prosperity in the area.

To help secure local support for the project, DG Fuels says it has engaged with community members and local government officials to draft a legally binding Community Benefits Agreement that would provide $26 million in funding towards a community centre, a health clinic, paid internships and other benefits. The CBA received support from the St. James Parish Council in February.

The company expects to purchase $120 million of sugar cane waste from local farmers, with nearly one third of this directly benefiting farmers in St. James Parish. This provides an environmentally-friendly and financially attractive alternative to practices where farmers burn the sugar cane trash after harvesting, it adds.

“Our clean facility will have fewer air emissions than a standard US hospital, will have no impact on the Mississippi River and will help to heal our planet,” says the company. “Our fuel made from sugar cane and plant waste is clean, sustainable and created with renewable energy.”

The FT CANS technology converts synthesis gas created in the DG Fuels’ proprietary production process to synthetic crude for further processing into SAF. FT CANS is being used by Fulcrum BioEnergy to convert municipal solid waste into SAF at its Sierra plant.

“Our FT CANS technology solution brings together decades of science and engineering expertise from bp and Johnson Matthey, and this project shows its competitiveness across a range of production scales and feedstock sources the industry needs,” said Noemie Turner, VP Technology Development & Commercialisation at bp. “We’re excited to see the relationship with DG Fuels grow, and we look forward to seeing this project come to fruition.”

Added Christopher Chaput, President of DG Fuels: “With this technology, we will create a product that is responsibly made and can be immediately substituted for conventional aviation fuel with no engine adaptations. This partnership is a significant boost to help the aviation industry reach its climate goals.”

SAFFiRE acquisition

Southwest Airlines first invested in SAFFiRE Renewables during the first phase of the ethanol producer’s pilot project in 2022 and through its newly-launched Southwest Airlines Renewable Ventures (SARV) subsidiary, the airline has now moved to acquire the company. As a result, SAFFiRE is expected to proceed with phase two by developing a pilot plant hosted at Conestoga’s Arkalon Energy ethanol facility in Liberal, Kansas.

“This acquisition marks Southwest’s transition from investor to sole owner of SAFFiRE, expressing our confidence in their technology and its potential to advance our sustainability goals, as well as the goals of the broader industry,” commented the airline’s CEO, Bob Jordan.

SAFFiRE is part of a project supported by the Department of Energy (DOE) to develop and produce scalable renewable ethanol. The Kansas plant will utilise SAFFiRE’s exclusive technology licence from NREL to process 10 tons of corn stover per day into ethanol, with a plan for the ethanol to be converted into SAF by LanzaJet’s alcohol-to-jet (ATJ) technology, which partly owes its development to the DOE’s Pacific Northwest National Lab. LanzaJet was added to the SARV portfolio in February when the airline announced a $30 million investment in the ATJ company.

Another agricultural residue, corn stover is the stalks, leaves and husks of corn plants that is largely left to decompose in the fields after the corn harvest each year. SAFFiRE plans for corn stover to be collected by custom harvesters or by local farmers and processed through a proprietary Deacetylation and Mechanical Refining (DMR) technology developed by NREL, called DMR pretreatment.

“Renewable ethanol is an important feedstock to realising high-volume, affordable SAF, which is a critical part of the journey to net zero emissions,” said Tom Nealon, President of SARV and CEO of SAFFiRE. “We are enthusiastic about the ethanol-to-SAF pathway and SAFFiRE’s potential ability to produce renewable ethanol at a scale that is economically viable.”

Image: Render of the proposed DG Fuels SAF facility on the banks of the Mississippi River in Louisiana

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Following their multi-year agreement, Montana Renewables has begun first shipments of sustainable aviation fuel to Shell Aviation for onward delivery to Shell’s US customers that include JetBlue, Alaska Airlines and Delta Air Lines. Montana Renewables claims it will be producing around 30 million gallons of SAF per year and make it the largest SAF producer in North America, with plans to significantly increase that amount over the next two to three years. The company’s location is close to major feedstock sources in the US and Canada, including the temperate oil seed growing zone and large farm and ranch operations in the region. Shell and its affiliates are expanding and building supply chain capabilities to blend and distribute SAF throughout the United States to enable more customers with access to the fuel.

“We’re proud to collaborate with Shell to improve aviation sustainability,” said Bruce Fleming, CEO Montana Renewables (MRL). “Strong support from the State of Montana, Cascade County and the City of Great Falls made possible the unique speed of Montana Renewables, and Shell is the logical offtake partner for us to reach multiple airlines and airports from our geographically advantaged site. We are now producing more SAF than any other North American company, on top of our renewable diesel and renewable hydrogen.”

MRL, whose renewable fuels plant began operations in late 2022 following investment of over $1 billion since Calumet acquired the business in 2012, has applied for International Sustainability & Carbon Certification (ISCC) CORSIA certification. It is permitted for 15,000 barrels per stream day of renewable feedstocks, which include seed oils, used cooking oil and tallow, for conversion into low-emission alternatives.

In April, Delta announced an agreement to purchase 10 million gallons of neat SAF from Shell Aviation, to be used over two years at Los Angeles International Airport. The agreement also includes testing the Avelia blockchain-powered digital book-and-claim platform launched by Shell Aviation and its partners last year.

“This is a great example of the kind of action and investment needed in states across our country that we need to meet our aggressive SAF goals as an industry,” said Pam Fletcher, the airline’s Chief Sustainability Officer. “There’s not enough SAF being produced today to power the world’s commercial airlines for a single day, so we’re grateful to everyone at the State of Montana, Montana Renewables and Shell for providing the incentives and taking meaningful steps towards scaling production of this largest known lever we have for decarbonising aviation.”

According to Delta’s ESG Report for 2022, the airline has a goal of replacing 10% of its jet fuel consumption by 10% by the end of 2030 and expects this to require at least 400 million gallons of SAF annually. At the end of 2022, Delta had agreements in place, “subject to third-party investment and timely facility development”, with multiple suppliers for an aggregate offtake of 200 million gallons towards the 2030 target.

“We continue to purchase from and align with leaders in the SAF industry to accelerate our yearly procurement,” says the report.

Photo: Shell Aviation

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Delta Air Lines is to launch its own innovation lab to help accelerate the research, design and testing of ideas and technologies aimed at leading to a more sustainable future of air travel and help reach the airline’s goal of net zero emissions by 2050. The Delta Sustainable Skies Lab will feature work already ongoing at the airline and pair the operational expertise of its teams from different divisions with outside innovators “to inspire new ideas and spur industry advancement,” said Pam Fletcher, Delta’s Chief Sustainability Officer, who is leading the strategy. It will include an ‘Engagement & Ideation Studio’ at Delta’s Atlanta headquarters, which will host students, employees, sustainability thought leaders and the “world’s greatest inventors”. The airline said it will continue to test concepts for reducing its environmental impact, including novel technology to decrease aircraft drag and emissions. It is collaborating with MIT to test methods and develop tools to eliminate persistent contrails.

“The Lab will lead the industry by going beyond financial investments, contributing Delta talent and know-how to ensure Delta is the airline of choice for disruptors hoping to test and launch their ideas,” explained Fletcher. “It’s a place to showcase advancements and a movement to galvanise everyone with a stake in creating the more sustainable future of flight.”

The Lab will bring together senior leaders in Delta’s Flight Operations, Technical Operations, Inflight Services, Operations & Customer Center and Fleet, with Delta’s Carbon Council serving as the model. “Much like Delta views safety, sharing best practices and being transparent about its sustainability approach is central to The Lab’s mission,” said the airline, which pointed out that more than 10 million gallons in fuel savings had resulted in 2022 alone.

However, said Fletcher: “With aviation being a hard-to-decarbonise industry, none of us can do this alone. We’re rolling out the welcome mat for disruptors of choice to take advantage of Delta’s global resources.”

The Lab will attract the next generation of ‘doers’ who evolve how airlines think about decarbonisation, expects the airline, and join other previously announced sustainability partners such as Airbus and eVTOL start-up Joby Aviation. Last October, Delta announced an upfront equity investment of $60 million in Joby, with a potential total of $200 million if milestones are achieved, which envisages using Joby’s eVTOL aircraft to operate city-to-airport services, initially in New York and Los Angeles.

The collaboration with MIT’s Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics will harness an MIT-created algorithm that predicts altitudes and locations where contrails are likely to form and study the causes of persistent contrails, assess the environmental impact and test possible solutions. The tools and technology planned as part of the study are being created under an open-source licence that will allow others to join in advancing the work.

Under a Memorandum of Understanding with Aero Design Labs, the airline will be testing drag-reduction technology on its 737-800 and 737-900 fleets starting this quarter. Delta will have the option to purchase ADL’s ADRS kits upon FAA certification to outfit most of its more than 200 aircraft in the two fleets.

The Engagement Studio will open and operate in phases and will feature interactive digital walls, virtual reality stations and experiential mock-ups, and welcome stakeholders to meet, collaborate and share ideas “to build momentum across the industry and beyond.”

Added Fletcher: “This work is imperative for our planet and our business. We’ve seen how critical human connection is to thrive – and how travel is the great enabler. As we make progress towards our sustainability goals, we want to make sure our customers will feel as good about flying as they do about the connections made with the people and places we take them to.”

Image: The Delta Sustainable Skies Lab vision concept

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Further commitments have been announced by major airlines in Europe and the US for sustainable aviation fuel, collectively totalling around 550 million gallons. Air France-KLM has signed an MoU with its long-term fuel supplier TotalEnergies for up to 800,000 tonnes of SAF, or 264 million gallons, for its group of airlines, while low-cost European carrier Ryanair has partnered with Shell for another 360,000 tonnes, or 120 million gallons, and US operator JetBlue will take at least 92 million gallons of blended product from Fidelis New Energy. The three deals add to other significant offtake agreements this year by each of the airline groups as they ramp up their decarbonisation activities. Meanwhile, Virgin Atlantic is to purchase 70 million gallons of SAF over seven years as part of a new agreement with joint venture partner Delta Air Lines. The fuel, which will be produced by Gevo, will be used on flights from the US West Coast.

The Air France-KLM agreement with TotalEnergies, a strategic partner since 2014, specifies the supply of 800,000 tonnes of SAF over 10 years, with deliveries commencing in 2023. The fuel will be used by Air France, KLM and Transavia largely for flights departing from French airports, in line with national SAF blending requirements, as well as from the Netherlands. The fuel will also comply with the airline group’s policy that any SAF it procures must not compete with human food or animal feed, that it not be derived from palm oil and that it be certified as compliant.

As of earlier this year, KLM flights from Amsterdam Schiphol have been operating with a minimum of 0.5% SAF in their jet fuel and the French government has introduced a 1% SAF mandate on flights from French airports, a level that is expected to rise to 2% in 2025 and 5% in 2030 in line with proposed EU regulation. Crop-based fuels have been excluded from use in the French mandate.

“Air France-KLM is fully committed to advancing SAF production in Europe and around the world,” said CEO Benjamin Smith. “This MoU with TotalEnergies is another building block to further the development of a French SAF industry that can meet the airlines’ needs. This therefore marks a fundamental milestone in the successful decarbonisation of our business. We are continuing to step up our efforts to reduce the impact of our operations as quickly as possible.” 

TotalEnergies is targeting 1.5 million tonnes of SAF production by 2030 using waste and residues including used cooking oil, animal fats and synthetic fuels. “This new partnership with Air France-KLM exemplifies the excellence of industry and French aerospace in committing to a more sustainable aviation sector,” said its CEO Patrick Pouyanné, adding biofuel development was a company priority. “By directly reducing the carbon intensity of the energy products used by our air transport customers, we are actively working with them to achieve net zero emissions by 2050, together with society.”

In recent initiatives, Air France-KLM group airlines have operated a range of flights using between 16% and 30% SAF sourced from TotalEnergies.

The latest SAF deal coincides with confirmation that under the group’s scope 1 and 3 emissions reduction targets, Air France Group and KLM have been assessed and validated under the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) as aligning with the ‘well-below 2 degrees Celsius’ objective determined as part of the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate. The strategy is primarily centred on reducing direct and indirect CO2 emissions by 30% per passenger/km by 2030 compared to 2019.

In another European partnership, low-cost carrier Ryanair has signed an MoU with global energy company Shell for the supply of SAF to more than 200 airports across Europe, in particular the airline’s biggest bases in Dublin and London Stansted.

Through this deal, the airline expects to access up to 360,000 tonnes, or 120 million gallons, of SAF between 2025 and 2030, with the fuels produced via multiple technology pathways and using a range of sustainable feedstocks. It estimates that using this amount of SAF would reduce CO2 emissions from its flights by more than 900,000 tonnes, equivalent to the output of over 70,000 Dublin-Milan services.

“SAF plays a key role in our Pathway to Net Zero strategy, and also our commitment to a target of 12.5% SAF by 2030,” said Thomas Fowler, Ryanair’s Sustainability Director. The agreement with Shell would enable the airline to procure around 20% of the SAF needed to meet this target, he said, while progressing its aggressive growth strategy, which estimates that passenger volumes will reach 168 million in FY2023, en-route to a target of 225 million per year by FY2026. 

Jan Toschka, President of Shell Aviation, said their agreement demonstrated that both companies viewed SAF as the key to net zero aviation emissions. “It is fantastic to build on our existing relationship with Ryanair to now look at what we can achieve together on sustainability,” he said. “Leadership and bold actions are needed to accelerate the decarbonisation of flight.”

In the US, JetBlue and Fidelis New Energy (FNE) have signed an MoU on SAF, through which the airline will source at least 92 million gallons of blended product over a five-year term from 2025. The fuel will be designed to achieve negative lifecycle carbon intensity by integrating carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) and biomass energy with CCS (BECCS). The SAF will be produced at FNE’s Gron Fuels GigaSystem at the Port of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, which the company estimates will produce 1 billion gallons per year of SAF, renewable diesel and other low carbon products. The new plant will also use waste process heat to generate power, producing biogas from by-products and using flexible processing methods to produce carbon-negative SAF from existing and emerging feedstocks.

Although JetBlue is already a regular user of SAF, it accounts for less than 1% of the airline’s total fuel usage. “We need significantly more supply to reach our 2040 net zero target,” said Sara Bogdan, JetBlue’s Director of Sustainability and ESG. “With partners like Fidelis and their carbon negative Gron Fuels Gigasystem, we are not only supplying our own growing SAF needs, we’re sending a powerful signal that significant demand for SAF exists. By introducing negative carbon intensity SAF to our network, we are also taking steps towards reaching true carbon neutrality as an airline.”

In addition to producing carbon negative SAF, Fidelis Co-founder and COO Bengt Jarlsjo said his company’s high-capacity carbon sink was expected to permanently sequester some 5 million tons of biogenic CO2 per year from the Louisiana facility.

JetBlue has also had a science-based, Paris-aligned climate target to reduce jet fuel emissions approved by the SBTi. The airline commits to reducing well-to-wake scope 1 and 3 GHG emissions by 50% per revenue tonne kilometre (RTK) by 2035 from a 2019 base year, with a goal of reaching net zero carbon emissions by 2040, 10 years ahead of the sector’s target. The airline said SAF is expected to be the key contributor to large-scale lifecycle emissions reduction, although it is highly dependent on availability and costs of supply.

Virgin Atlantic Airways has announced a 70 million gallon commitment to SAF with its 49% shareholder Delta Air Lines, and to be produced by Gevo. The fuel will be supplied by Delta to Virgin Atlantic at a rate of 10 million US gallons per year over seven years at either Los Angeles or San Francisco airports. It will represent 20% of Virgin Atlantic’s commitment to 10% SAF use by 2030 and equate to around 500 trans-Atlantic flights from Los Angeles.

The parties have not disclosed a start date for deliveries of SAF, which will come from one of Gevo’s future production facilities. Gevo separates sugars and proteins from sustainably farmed non-edible industrial corn, with the sugars then used to produce SAF and the proteins fed to livestock, whose manure can then be processed to develop renewable natural gas and agricultural fertiliser.

“We know that SAF has a fundamental role to play in aviation decarbonisation,” said Holly Boyd Boland, VP Corporate Development at Virgin Atlantic. “The demand from airlines is clear and Virgin Atlantic is committed to supporting the scale up of SAF production at pace. We cannot meet our collective ambition of Net Zero 2050 without it.”

In March this year, Delta signed an agreement with Gevo valued at around $2.8 billion to purchase 75 million gallons per year over seven years, subject to Gevo developing, financing and constructing one or more production facilities to fulfil the quantity.

Image: Air France-KLM

The world’s second-largest airline Delta will acquire 385 million gallons of a new, low-emission sustainable aviation fuel from emerging US-based supplier DG Fuels in a seven-year deal due to take effect from 2027. DG Fuels will produce the SAF from biomass feedstocks using a new process which it says will cut lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions by up to 85% compared to conventional aviation fuels. Unlike other SAF programmes, which DG Fuels says only consume a small amount of the carbon stored in feedstocks, its new system will use up to 97%, recycling excess CO2 to produce more SAF. “There’s not more carbon in the feedstock we use. We have developed a system that converts more of the carbon into SAF,” said DG Fuels President and CFO Christopher Chaput, who claims the process can produce three-to-four times more SAF from the same amount of biomass than its competitors.

Delta has been one of the most active purchasers of SAF, committing earlier this year to a massive 525 million gallons from renewable energy group Gevo for delivery over seven years from mid-2026. As well as increasing its SAF supplies, the new deal with DG Fuels aligns with a previous commitment by Delta to replace at least 5% of its conventional jet fuel by 2030 with SAF that reduces lifecycle emissions by at least 85%. The airline has also pledged that by 2030, 10% of its total jet fuel will be SAF.

“Achieving a sustainable future for travel will require us all to work together across industries and encourage innovations like DG Fuels’ new low-emissions SAF option,” said Delta’s Chief Sustainability Officer, Pam Fletcher. “SAF is essential to our industry’s more sustainable future, and new supply chain streams will help ensure sustainable fuel becomes more available and affordable.”

With soaring demand for non-fossil fuels and restrictions on the use of some controversial feedstocks, there is a growing shift to sources other than increasingly-expensive fats, oils and greases (FOGs), which are currently the most common bases for SAF. DG Fuels says timber waste will be used for Delta’s SAF, of which 55 million gallons will be delivered in each year of the agreement. Corn stover and cotton gin waste – the seeds surrounding cotton fibres – are also feedstock options for the fuel.

“Cellulosic biomass feedstock SAF is the key to scaled deployment that moves the needle for the aviation industry in reducing its carbon footprint,” said DG Fuels’ Chaput. “Delta is a known innovator in the airline industry, so we’re excited to work with them on implementing this long-term partnership.” As well as maximising carbon utilisation, DG Fuels claims its new SAF will offer 7% more energy density than conventional jet fuels, providing either greater flying range or higher payloads. “In the example of a fully-fuelled Boeing 747 aircraft, it would have an additional 17,500 pounds payload for the same range.”

DG Fuels intends to develop SAF production facilities in North America and Europe, with the first to be established in the US state of Louisiana. Site preparation will begin late in 2023, plant construction is expected to take three years, and the first fuel deliveries are expected by the last quarter of 2026. Initially, said the company, some excess CO2 might be sequestered until sufficient green power is available to scale up the conversion of syngas to liquid SAF.  

As well as making it the biggest SAF customer for DG Fuels, this deal also progresses Delta’s Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) goal to reduce its ‘well-to-wake’ scope 1 and 3 greenhouse gas emissions by 45% per revenue tonne kilometre by 2035, compared to 2019. The initiative has been developed to both define and promote emissions reductions goals that climate scientists believe are necessary for a 1.5 C degree future.

Late last year, Delta joined the First Movers Coalition, a public-private partnership and advocacy platform created to expedite and scale up the development of breakthrough technologies and fuels to help reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of hard-to-abate industries, including air transport. The initiative, led by the US State Department and the World Economic Forum, was announced during last year’s COP26.

Announcing the airline’s participation in the coalition, Delta’s Managing Director of Sustainability, Amelia DeLuca, said the advocacy group “will help spur the markets and policy environment essential to developing the sustainable fuels and technologies needed to combat climate change.” The airline is also a member of other climate change action groups including the Mission Possible Partnership, Clean Skies for Tomorrow, Aviation Climate Taskforce, and the LEAF Coalition, all intent on actions to help mitigate aviation’s contribution to global warming.

In addition to its SAF commitments, Delta has recently announced a major renewal of its narrowbody jet fleet, placing firm orders for 100 Boeing 737-10 aircraft for delivery from 2025. The airline also has options to acquire another 30 of the jets, the largest variant of the 737 MAX family, which the airframer says will be 30% more fuel efficient than older aircraft they will replace. Delta also recently introduced the first of 155 new Airbus A321neo jets, all of which are due to be delivered by 2027.  

Photo: Delta Air Lines Boeing 737 MAX

United Airlines Ventures (UAV) has announced an investment in New York-based Dimensional Energy, the airline group’s fourth move into sustainable aviation fuel production, and its first into power-to-liquid (PtL) technology, in which carbon dioxide is transformed into SAF. United has also agreed to purchase at least 300 million gallons of SAF from Dimensional over 20 years, adding to multiple existing agreements that the airline claims add up to the biggest collective SAF commitment by any airline. The deal caps off a flurry of fresh SAF announcements across the US, from Hawaii to New York, as the air transport industry intensifies efforts to cut its carbon emissions. A project involving Delta Air Lines and Neste is now delivering SAF through fuel pipeline systems direct to New York LaGuardia. Meanwhile, there have been renewed calls from across the US aviation sector for greater government incentives to expedite and increase the availability of affordable supplies of SAF, reports Tony Harrington.

Dimensional Energy converts carbon dioxide and water into usable ingredients for the Fischer-Tropsch (FT) process that can turn those elements and others into liquid fuels. While this system has been widely used to create fossil fuels, Dimensional claims it will be one of the first to produce sustainable aviation fuels from the process. Last year, the company’s activities attracted funding from climate technology investor Elemental Excelerator, through which it was introduced to United, which wants to cut emissions directly rather than through offsets.

“Sometimes you have to look to the past to solve new problems and we recognise that decarbonising air travel is going to require combining proven technologies, such as Fischer-Tropsch, with the latest advances in science and engineering,” said United Airlines Ventures President Michael Leskinen. “As we grow our portfolio of companies like Dimensional, we are creating opportunities to scale these early-stage technologies and achieve United’s commitment to carbon neutrality by 2050, without the use of traditional carbon offsets.”

UAV has already invested in SAF producer Alder Fuels, from which United Airlines will acquire up to 1.5 billion gallons of SAF, while United itself has bought into Fulcrum Bioenergy, together with an option to buy up to 900 million gallons of SAF. As well, UAV recently invested in Cemvita Factory, a US-based synthetic biology company which is planning SAF production.

Dimensional says it can transform carbon dioxide from sources including direct emissions from industrial sites, direct air capture and biological paths including fermentation and biomass gasification, providing United with some protection from the constraints of feedstock availability affecting other biofuel pathways. Last year, in Tucson, Arizona, the company began constructing a CO2-to-fuels facility, part-powered by locally-produced renewable energy, and expects to begin operating next month.

”United’s support of sustainable aviation fuel made from captured emissions is an important step in the aviation industry’s pursuit of carbon neutrality,” said Jason Salfi, CEO and joint founder of Dimensional Energy. “We envision a world run on truly conflict-free energy that can scale to meet the global demand for hydrocarbon fuels and feedstocks.”

Meanwhile, competitor Delta Air Lines was one of four participants in a milestone project to deliver the first supplies of SAF to New York’s LaGuardia Airport using existing infrastructure. The fuel was processed in Texas by waste-to-SAF producer Neste, then transported via the Colonial and Buckeye pipeline systems to the airport to power a Delta flight. “SAF is the most effective tool we have to decarbonise our industry,” said Delta’s Chief Sustainability Officer, Pamela Fletcher. “These efforts show how existing infrastructure can be used to transport SAF to east coast airports and drive down emissions, a critical step as we move toward a more sustainable future for air travel.”   

The fuel was loaded by Neste into the Colonial Pipeline and pumped almost 1,500 miles to New Jersey, where it was transferred into the Buckeye Pipeline which feeds LaGuardia Airport. “The US east coast is home to some of the USA’s busiest airports and the vast majority of them get their fuel from the Colonial Pipeline system and, in New York, the Buckeye Pipeline system,” added Chris Cooper, Neste’s VP of Renewable Aviation in the Americas. “What we’re doing here is showing that just around the corner is a future where passengers at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson, up to LaGuardia, JFK (Kennedy Airport) and EWR (Newark Airport) can board a plane flying on SAF.”

Delta and Neste have called for additional government policy settings and supply chain incentives in the US to increase production pf SAF, while driving down its cost. Announcing the LaGuardia initiative, they said: “A SAF Blender’s Tax Credit, for example, that is technology and raw material-neutral, will even the playing field between SAF and fossil jet fuel. At the state level, a Low Carbon Fuel Standard with voluntary opt-in provisions for SAF will provide a policy framework with a proven track record to incentivise SAF production and speed the development of cleaner infrastructure, supporting healthier environments for our communities.”

In Los Angeles, alongside the IX Summit of the Americas, at a roundtable event they hosted on sustainable air transport, industry body IATA and Boeing also ramped up pressure on governments to support SAF production with incentives.

”To reach the industry’s net zero goal, governmental support is critical to developing policies that efficiently accelerate the commercial production and deployment of SAF,” said Peter Cerdá, IATA’s Regional VP for the Americas.

Landon Loomis, Boeing’s VP Latin America, Caribbean and Global Policy, added: “The message from the experts at the roundtable is clear. In addition to a sector-wide partnership, it takes policy commitments, technology deployment and infrastructure efficiency improvements to achieve the industry’s commitment to reach decarbonisation by mid-century.”

Corresponding with the event, Boeing and seven airlines – Aeromexico, Alaska Airlines, American Airlines, COPA Airlines, Delta, United and WestJet – collectively bought 100,000 gallons of SAF (379,000 litres) from World Energy to part-power flights from Los Angeles International Airport, collectively cutting their CO2 emissions by around 472,000 pounds (214.3 tonnes).

In a message to the roundtable, John Kerry, US Special Presidential Envoy for Climate, said: “Reducing emissions from hard to decarbonise sectors like aviation is essential to tackling climate change. I am encouraged by the commitment of airlines worldwide to scale up the use of sustainable aviation fuels, which have the potential to not only significantly reduce emissions in-sector but also to provide economic opportunity.”

As part of its 2022 ecoDemonstrator programme, Boeing will fly one of its own 777-200ER aircraft using a 30/70 SAF blend for all test flights. During the next six months of flight and ground tests, Boeing will evaluate around 30 new technologies aimed at improving sustainability and safety for the aerospace industry, including a water conservation system to reduce aircraft weight and fuel, and technologies to improve operational efficiency.

Separately in Honolulu, Hawaiian Airlines announced a partnership with Par Hawaii, one of the state’s largest energy providers, to explore the viability of developing SAF in the islands from sustainable crops, while in Houston, Texas, renewable energy start-up No Carbon Air announced plans to produce sustainable aviation fuel, hydrogen fuel, and other green energy sources through Fischer-Tropsch conversion of landfill materials including municipal solid waste, hazardous materials, tyres, waste coal, sludges and other waste streams. The company’s CEO, Bill Smith, said the waste, once converted to synthetic gas, would be processed through an FT system capable of producing 3,000 gallons of sustainable jet fuel per day, or 1 million gallons per year.

Photo: United Airlines

The SkyTeam airline alliance has just completed its first Sustainable Flight Challenge, in which member airlines demonstrated or tested initiatives in the air and on the ground to help reduce their carbon emissions, with the results to be shared across the industry. The challenge, which required participants to maximise decarbonisation measures on specific flights between May 1 and 14, attracted 16 of the alliance’s 18 members, and delivered outcomes including services part-powered by large volumes of sustainable aviation fuel and weight-saving operational measures such as the use of new, lightweight aircraft tyres. The concept of the Sustainable Flight Challenge was developed by The Bold Moves, a group of employees within SkyTeam member airline KLM, who were inspired by a 1934 air race between London and Melbourne, designed to demonstrate the possibilities of long-range commercial flights. SkyTeam adopted the KLM idea and expanded it to encourage all its member airlines and partners to participate, reports Tony Harrington. Meanwhile, SkyTeam member Saudia has undertaken what it claims is the world’s longest net positive flight through a carbon offsetting partnership with CarbonClick and aviation consultancy SimpliFlying.

“The climate crisis is the greatest challenge facing our industry, and there’s no time to lose,” commented SkyTeam on the Sustainable Flight initiative. “As airlines, we need to reshape the future of air travel for generations to come. Together, we are committed to further reducing our carbon footprint by finding new ways to cut emissions, make our fleets more efficient and better care for the world we connect. We’re challenging ourselves to innovate, reaching for new heights to find as-yet undiscovered solutions that we can put into practice across our industry.”

As originator of the Sustainable Flight Challenge, KLM operated two flights from Amsterdam as part of the project, one a Boeing 787-10 widebody service to Edmonton, Canada, the other an Embraer E190 regional jet to Porto, Portugal, each incorporating more than 50 efficiency measures, including a 39% blend of sustainable aviation fuel. Weight-saving initiatives included the use of artificial intelligence modelling to predict the amount of water needed for each flight, lightweight cargo pallets and nets, and optimised aircraft loading to ensure the best centre of gravity, to improve flight aerodynamics and reduce fuel burn by 1.5-2%. Pilots also collaborated with air traffic controllers to identify the most efficient air routes, while on the ground, business class passengers were asked to pre-select meals in order to minimise uplift of catering which would not be used, while transport companies delivering freight were asked to use vehicles powered by electricity or biodiesel fuel.

Air France also operated two flights part-powered by SAF, and performed with new, more fuel-efficient jets – an Airbus A350 from Paris to Montreal, using a 16% SAF blend produced by TotalEnergies, and an Airbus A220 from Paris to Lisbon with a 30% SAF mix, both well above the mandatory 1% blend required on all flights from France, and aligned with the airline’s target of 30% less CO2 emissions per passenger kilometre by 2030, compared to 2019. The airline said both flights were also supported by initiatives including single-engine taxiing and optimised routes, each achieving CO2 reductions of close to 45% compared to routine services. It foreshadowed greater use of AI to optimise flight paths, and use of autonomous tractors to help decarbonise baggage transport at airports.

In the US, Delta Air Lines used a Boeing 737-900ER – the most fuel-efficient aircraft type in its fleet – to operate a sustainable flight from its Atlanta home base to Salt Lake City. The plane was part-powered by 400 gallons of SAF, provided by Gevo, and the largest volume of sustainable fuel uplifted on a flight from Atlanta. The aircraft was also equipped with new main landing gear tyres which reduced weight by 100 pounds (45kgs), while at both ends of the journey the flight was serviced by 100% electric ground equipment used to transport baggage and fuel. Delta has pledged that 25% of its ground service vehicle fleet will be electrically powered by the end of 2022, up from 20% now, and rising to 50% by the end of 2025. Other features of its sustainable flight included recyclable packaging for beverages and no disposable plastic.

Another SkyTeam member, Saudi Arabian Airlines (Saudia), as part of the Sustainable Flight Challenge, has claimed the world’s longest net positive flight through a carbon offsetting partnership with New Zealand-based CarbonClick and aviation consultancy SimpliFlying. The airline said 346 tonnes of carbon emissions were offset from a six-hour, Boeing 787-9 flight between Jeddah and Madrid. The flight also incorporated the first in-flight ‘sustainability lab’, in which passengers contributed suggestions on how to reduce the environmental impact of flying.  To offset the flight’s emissions, CarbonClick will apply the airline’s contributions to the generation of wind-powered electricity in India, enabling wind turbines to be powered for 26 days, and delivering sustainable electricity to communities in Bhuj, in the western state of Gujurat.

SkyTeam said the pressures presented by Covid-19 meant that not all of the alliance’s member airlines could participate in the inaugural Sustainable Flight Challenge but expressed confidence that more would join in future years, with outcomes shared not only across the alliance, but further afield. “The industry as a whole will benefit from the challenge,” said SkyTeam. “That’s because everything we learn we will share open source. It’s our commitment to finding new ways to reduce our industry’s footprint and bring the future of sustainable air travel forward. What’s more, we hope to broaden participation in years to come.”

Photo: KLM

Delta Air Lines has announced plans to acquire 525 million gallons (2 billion litres) of sustainable aviation fuel from Colorado-based renewable energy group Gevo, in a seven-year deal scheduled to start from mid-2026. The agreement will provide approximately 75 million gallons (280 million litres) of SAF per year for the term of the agreement, which Gevo said would supersede a 2019 commitment by Delta to buy 10 million gallons (39 million litres) per year. The expanded partnership would also progress the airline’s goal of operating 10% of its flights with SAF by the end of 2030, for which it said it would need a total of 400 million gallons (1.5 billion litres) per year – a substantial jump from last year’s purchases, with corporate partners, of more than 300,000 gallons (just over 1.1 billion litres). The world’s second-largest airline said the partnership with Gevo would significantly increase its access to SAF, while growing the market for alternative fuel, and used the occasion to urge greater effort by governments and industry to ensure sufficient and affordable supplies of SAF if the air transport sector was to meet its decarbonisation targets, reports Tony Harrington.

“SAF is our best opportunity today for meaningful reductions in emissions from air travel, but the market needs investment and engagement from all stakeholders,” said Pam Fletcher, Chief Sustainability Officer at Delta, mirroring industry concerns about the lack and cost of sustainable fuels. “From Federal policy that puts it financially on par with road-based fuels to broad corporate interest, all stakeholders need to drive forward access to SAF in order to expand the market and meet the needs of the industry.”

Gevo CEO Patrick Gruber said Delta recognised that “big change is needed” for the aviation industry to achieve its 2050 target of net zero emissions. “SAF production creates good-paying jobs in manufacturing, improves the environmental quality for all, and fosters rural economic opportunity for feedstocks and pathways,” he said. “With the right policies and incentives in place, we can unlock a future where sustainable aviation fuel is a viable climate solution that benefits air travel and beyond.”

Through two alcohol-to-jet processes, which can use low-carbon feedstocks produced using sustainable agriculture, Gevo can produce energy-dense liquid hydrocarbons including sustainable aviation fuels. “We expect production from our first net-zero plant to begin in 2025,” reported Gruber. “To meet the demand that we now have under contract, we need to develop and build more than one net-zero plant.”

The Delta-Gevo agreement comes just a day after the announcement of a deal between Gevo and six members of the oneworld airline alliance (see article), reflecting increasing commitment by major operators to using renewable aviation fuels. But the agreement also highlights growing concerns about limited supplies of affordable SAF, which IATA is relying upon to deliver 65% of airlines’ carbon emission reductions by 2050.

During the seven-year term of the new partnership between Delta and Gevo, major airframe and aero engine manufacturers expect to achieve regulatory certification which will enable flights to be operated with 100% SAF, double the amount currently permitted for commercial air transport. To operate its flights purely with SAF, Delta estimated it would need around 4 billion gallons (over 15 billion litres) per year.

Today, said the airline, “the market remains nascent due to limited supply and high costs. There is only enough SAF available on the market to support one day of Delta’s operations at pre-pandemic levels. But the industry needs this technology to grow and develop as it is the most meaningful solution to reducing aviation’s carbon emissions.”

In addition to its SAF purchases, Delta is a member of the First Movers Coalition, a public-private partnership led by the US State Department and World Economic Forum, to support and advance the development of new technologies and fuels to help reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of hard-to-abate industries including air transport. The airline said that through this and other like-minded collaborations, it promoted policy support and market incentives to help drive the SAF sector, including a SAF-specific blenders tax credit and “a robust SAF grant programme”.

Photo: Delta Air Lines

In March 2020, Delta Air Lines announced it was committing $1 billion over 10 years towards a goal of becoming the first major carbon-neutral airline. A year on, the US airline has expanded its vision of ‘zero-impact aviation’ in which air travel does not damage the environment directly or indirectly via GHG emissions, noise, waste generation or other environmental impacts. Delta has offset its growth in carbon emissions since 2012 and says it is budgeting to spend more than $30 million on a portfolio of verified offsets to mitigate 13 million tonnes of its emissions between March and December 2020. It is also addressing emission reductions through fleet and operational efficiencies and last year retired more than 200 older aircraft. Longer term, Delta indicates it will invest in the acceleration of new technologies including sustainable aviation fuels (SAF), carbon capture and storage, and innovations in aircraft propulsion. It has also just signed an agreement with Deloitte to support the firm’s commitment to more sustainable business travel through the purchase of SAF. The world’s largest cargo airline, FedEx, is now planning to achieve carbon-neutral operations globally by 2040 and said it would help fund research into natural carbon sequestration solutions.

“Connecting the world and protecting our environment for future generations cannot be mutually exclusive,” said Delta CEO Ed Bastian. “Travellers should not have to choose between seeing the world and saving the world. We must continue to take immediate actions today and can’t wait for future solutions to become a reality. While there are many paths to carbon neutrality, Delta chose to make an impact today and invest in a future where aviation itself becomes cleaner for the world around us.”

Delta says its environmental sustainability plan is focused on three areas: carbon reduction and removal, stakeholder engagement and coalition building.

It reports the new aircraft entering the fleet contributed to fuel efficiency per available seat mile increasing by nearly 6% in 2020 over the previous year, amid the impact of Covid-19 and reduced passenger loads, saving 117 million gallons of fuel. The airline sees long-term potential for further emission reductions in future aircraft technology innovations such as propulsion, post-combustion emission controls, electric power delivery and fuel cells. These are still in the early stages of developments, says Delta, and are not expected to enter service “anytime soon” but reported it was evaluating partnerships to accelerate and support their advancement.

To achieve further carbon reduction advances in steps towards Delta’s ‘zero-impact’ goal for aviation, the airline says SAF shows great promise and has a medium-term target to replace 10% of its fossil jet fuel replace with a sustainable alternative by 2030.

It has agreements in place with Gevo to purchase 10 million gallons of SAF beginning in 2024 and 60 million gallons from Northwest Advanced Bio-Fuels starting in 2025. Combined, this represents a projected 1.7% of Delta’s total annual fuel consumption, adjusted for 2019 flying levels.

Just now though, says Delta, SAF is not available on a large enough scale and the market is so underdeveloped that all the SAF produced in 2020 would only power Delta’s fleet for one day pre-Covid.

In the near-term, Delta will rely on verified carbon offsets to achieve carbon neutrality. “As Delta invests in future technologies, carbon offsets are a viable, proven and immediate way to make an impact today,” said Sue Kolloru, VP Strategic Corporate Initiatives. “Our offset projects are making a measurable and meaningful difference by protecting forests, conserving wildlife and helping communities develop around the world.”

The 13 million tonnes of CO2 emissions Delta expects to offset from 2020 is equal to the carbon sequestered by 17 million acres (6.9 million ha) of US forests in one year, claims the airline. Two projects in Delta’s offset portfolio are Rimba Raya and Keo Seima, which protect forests through a community-driven conservation model involving local communities in Indonesia and Cambodia. The goal is for the portfolio to cover a range of projects covering carbon avoidance (deforestation), carbon reduction (wind and solar) and carbon removal (nature-based solutions such as afforestation and reforestation).

In the future, foresees Jerry Griffin, General Manager, Sustainability Strategy, carbon offset markets might include new carbon sequestration technologies like direct air capture where machines draw CO2 out of the air and store it in deep geological formations or use it to create products. “As part of our path to carbon removal, we will invest in these types of breakthrough projects to accelerate development, which is currently limited and very expensive,” he said.  

The second focus of Delta’s environmental sustainability plan involves engagement with investors, customers and employees. Delta points to its recent agreements with corporate customers Nike and Deloitte to purchase SAF facilitated by the airline in support of the two company’s commitment to sustainable business travel. The SAF will be supplied to Delta by Finnish renewable jet fuel producer Neste. The agreement with Deloitte represents a lifecycle CO2 emissions reduction of around 1,000 tonnes.

“Collaborations like this further support SAF development and represent the growing demand for innovations in clean fuel technologies,” commented Delta.

Deloitte has also just signed a similar SAF agreement with American Airlines, again to be supplied by Neste (see article).

The final thread of the Delta plan is to build coalitions with suppliers and other industry participants to drive down costs and increase the take-up of new technologies such as alternative fuels and carbon capture technology.

“This is not a competition,” said Bastian. “Uniting across industries to create a more sustainable future is imperative. The more that join us on this mission, the better.”

The airline expects to announce “multiple” partnerships within the next few months. It has already become a member of MIT’s Industry Liaison Program in order to understand and quantify aviation’s environmental impacts and inform a long-term plan to support industry innovation.

“Delta’s thoughtful approach to understanding the research ecosystem will help support research and development for the industry,” said Steven Barrett, Head of MIT’s Laboratory for Aviation and the Environment. “Developing coalitions to bring together leaders across industries is crucial in advancing a zero-impact future.”

FedEx, meanwhile, has pledged $2 billion in initial investment towards its new goal of carbon-neutral operations by 2040. The funding will major on three areas: vehicle electrification, sustainable energy and carbon sequestration. It includes a $100 million gift to Yale University to help establish the Yale Center for Natural Carbon Capture, with an initial focus on helping to offset GHG emissions equivalent to current airline emissions.

The Center’s researchers will develop methods that build on natural carbon storage systems, including biological ecosystems and the geological carbon cycle, with the aim of creating a portfolio of carbon removal strategies that can have an impact on a global scale. Following its aviation work, the Center will broaden its scope to address additional global sources of emissions and pledges to share its findings so that businesses, industries and governments can benefit from work that will accelerate the adoption and implementation of natural carbon capture strategies around the world.

“Addressing climate change is a complex challenge that demands urgent action, and natural carbon capture strategies will be one key part of that action,” said Dr Indy Burke, Dean of the Yale School of the Environment. “Through the creation of the Center, we aim to develop measurable carbon capture strategies to help offset carbon emissions globally.”

FedEx said it would continue to invest in alternative fuels to reduce aircraft and vehicle emissions. In 2015, FedEx agreed to purchase 3 million gallons of SAF from Red Rock Biofuels’ new biorefinery in Lakeview, Oregon, that was originally planned to open in 2017 but is now scheduled for completion this year. FedEx’s fuel conservation programme Fuel Sense and its aircraft modernisation programme have saved a combined 1.43 billion gallons of jet fuel and avoided over 13.5 million tonnes of CO2 emissions since 2012. “We have a responsibility to take bold action in addressing climate challenges,” said FedEx CEO Fred Smith, commenting on the new carbon-neutral pledge. “This goal builds on our longstanding commitment to sustainability throughout our operations, while at the same time investing in long-term transformational solutions for FedEx and our entire industry.”

Photo: Delta Air Lines