This week, a new report by Transport & Environment (T&E) was published. It provides an interesting overview of the global status of Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAF) and a SAF ranking of 77 airlines.
A preliminary note
SAF, or Sustainable Aviation Fuels, is an umbrella term for two completely different technology paths:
(1) Bio-SAF: These are predominantly vegetable oils, usually hydrogenated to HVO, which are produced either directly from virgin vegetable oils or from waste vegetable oils such as UCO. The lower-quality variants do not really deserve the label “sustainable”, especially if indirect emissions arise, for example, through indirect land-use change.
(2) E-SAF (e-kerosene) are e-fuels produced with high energy input from green hydrogen and CO2 or CO. They are very expensive and will remain rare for the foreseeable future, but currently offer the best climate balance.
The T&E Report: SAF – an inventory
T&E has published the report as part of its new “SAF Observatory”. The SAF strategies of 77 airlines and airline groups were examined. They represent 75% of global jet fuel consumption (2023).
The results show that the decarbonization of aviation fuels is still in its infancy and is also moving in the wrong direction.
In 2023, these 77 airlines consumed 1.6 billion barrels of fossil kerosene and just 2.6 million barrels of SAF. SAF thus provided only 0.15 % of fuel demand. Only two airlines exceeded the 1% mark: DHL with 3.3 % and Air France-KLM with 1.1 % SAF. IATA arrives at similar figures for the industry as a whole. It estimates that just under 0.01 mb/d of SAF was produced worldwide last year. A total of 6 mb/d was consumed.
If all the more or less binding SAF orders (MoUs, Offtake Agreements) are realized, the SAF share will increase from 0.15% to 1.3% by 2030, albeit with large regional differences:
– Europe 1.3 %
– USA 2.7 %, though with a high share of crop-based biofuel
– Airlines in Asia are still waiting in the wings but first announcements are expected soon
– Airlines in Africa and South America: SAF probably not starting for several years.
Bio-SAF dominates, very little E-SAF expected
The planned SAF share of 1.3 % (2030) would reduce direct greenhouse gas emissions (excluding contrails) by just 0.9%, since almost only bio-SAF is to be used, the production of which causes medium to high climate damage. Crop-based biofuels would then have a share of around 30%, waste oil/advanced biofuels around 60%, and e-kerosene under 10%.
In absolute terms, this would be 3.5 million t of e-kerosene and 39.6 million t of biofuels – if all offtake agreements are realized by 2030.
The lack of commitment to e-kerosene on the part of Big Oil is striking. Rather, Shell, BP & Co. are concentrating on the bio-route, which better suits their value chain and will probably never be able to achieve larger market shares at the expense of their core business with fossil fuels.
The Big6 (Exxonmobil, Chevron, TotalEnergies, Shell and BP, Eni) are currently planning to expand their SAF production volumes to 64,000 b/d. This corresponds to only 1 % of the current fossil jet fuel demand.
This means that it is mainly up to start-ups to advance the sector. In its report, T&E names HH2E/Sasol, Dimensional Energy, Twelve, Air Company and the SAF+ Consortium as the protagonists with the largest expansion targets by 2030.
Ranking of airlines
Only one passenger airline makes it into the second-highest category of the report (“B”): the Air France-KLM Group. Thanks to relatively large quantities of waste oil, this group is expected to be able to reduce its direct emissions by 4% by 2030.
The group in category C contains nine airlines, including United Airlines, the International Airlines Group (IAG, with British Airways and Iberia, among others) and the cargo airline DHL Group. The Lufthansa Group shares places 14-16 with two other airlines.
For 67 of the 77 airlines analyzed, there are no major observable SAF efforts. Not a single airline has a dedicated e-kerosene target, despite the ReFuelEU targets from 2030.
Source: Transport & Enviroment (SAF Observatory)
Final comment
Minimizing the climate damage caused by aviation is an unusually difficult undertaking for global climate policies:
– Aviation is only partially included in the climate reports of nation states (NIR), since most of it takes place in international airspace. In contrast to more nationally organized sectors, laborious international coordination is necessary, mainly within the framework of the ICAO or as a regional go-it-alone as with ReFuelEU in Europe.
– In addition, there is the specific problem that even decarbonized liquids produce climate-damaging contrails when burned, albeit less than their fossil-based equivalents. The greenhouse effect of contrails is difficult to calculate because it depends on many environmental factors. But many studies assume as a rule of thumb that the contrails roughly double the climate damage caused by aviation. A simple fuel change with drop-in fuels is therefore not enough.
– So far, 90% of the world’s population has never boarded an aircraft. The rapidly growing middle classes in China and the Global South now want to take long-haul trips, just like the Global North. From today’s perspective, it is neither feasible nor desirable to deprive large parts of the world of the opportunity to travel by air. It is therefore highly likely that air traffic will continue to grow.
If you take the number of media reports and the current climate strategies of airlines as a yardstick, Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAF) appear to be the central strategy for minimizing climate damage caused by aviation. The T&E report shows that this assessment is far removed from reality.
In fact, only a rapid increase in efficiency, a dedicated contrail policy and, in the longer term, if it is technically possible, a technological path towards hydrogen and battery propulsion will make a far-reaching decarbonization of aviation possible. As things stand, SAF, and this applies even more to bio-SAF, can only be one element for short or medium-term aviation policies.
Image: Courtesy Lufthansa Mediathek