How Aviation Can Cut Emissions by 2035 Using SAF and Existing Tech

by Jerome Bouchard and David Kaplan (Oliver Wyman/Forbes) Aviation needs to address its greenhouse gas emissions problem, yet the conversation and investment around decarbonization too often focuses on the wrong technologies and the wrong date. The industry cannot wait until 2050 to get serious about cutting emissions, which is what will happen if it pins too many of its hopes on hydrogen-propelled and battery-powered aircraft. Neither will be approved for use on medium-haul and long-haul commercial airliners much before 2050 — and that delay matters because aircraft with 100 seats or more are responsible for 96% of aviation’s emissions. It will then take decades to replace the thousands of older conventional jets in the global fleet — an action constrained by production capacity as well as economics.

While these non-fossil fuel technologies will eventually play a substantial role in making aviation less carbon-intensive, they will do little until 2040 — the early stage of their incorporation into the global fleet of smaller aircraft and short-haul airliners. By then, assuming business as usual and using a trajectory projected by the International Air Transport Association (IATA) in 2021, aircraft would be responsible for roughly 1.4 gigatons of emissions per year — 40% more than the one gigaton it emits today.

The key to cutting emissions over the next two decades is investment in two existing technologies with the potential to shrink aviation’s carbon footprint by as early as 2040 — sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) and conventional kerosene-powered jet engines. By investing in the production capacity for low-carbon SAF and rethinking current jet engines, the industry could cut 80% of its emissions by 2050, moving the needle in the right direction in a substantive way.

The problem: insufficient investment and a lack of urgency. Oliver Wyman calculates that for SAF production alone, the investment will need to be well over $1 trillion through 2050 to scale up. Currently, the SAF investment is a tiny percentage of that with airlines using less than 1% in their fuel consumption.

So what can the industry do? First, aviation must begin to take decisive actions today to increase SAF consumption and production.

In June, the World Economic Forum, the Airports Council International World, and more than 50 chief executives from aviation-related companies kicked off the Airports of Tomorrow initiaive in which one of the key pillars is a call for the construction of 300 SAF plants by 2030. READ MORE

Excerpt from Energy.AgWired.com: Sustainable aviation fuels (SAF) are poised to take off in a big way on the wings of carrier commitments and changes to biofuel policy, according to a new report from Rabobank.

“The Future for Sustainable Aviation Fuels” forecasts SAF production capacity could potentially increase from 25 million gallons now to nearly 2.2 billion gallons by 2026. Beyond that, it could grow to as much as 34 billion gallons by 2050 in the U.S. alone.

Most of that will come from corn and soybeans, but other feedstocks will be needed to reach that full capacity according to Owen Wagner, Rabobank Senior Analyst for Grains & Oilseeds, who was at the recent Farm Progress Show. “We’re seeing more and more winter canola grown,” said Wagner. “Camelia was the oilseed of choice when the Air Force began its SAF program in 2011.”

Excerpt from Mint: As prime mover of the Global Biofuel Alliance, India hopes to become a major supplier of sustainable aviation fuel. Whether bio-blends can clean up the sector, though, is unclear

Union minister Hardeep Singh Puri recently said that the Global Biofuel Alliance (GBA) could turn India into a major producer and exporter of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF). He was referring to a class of biofuels that could potentially reduce the climate-harming gas emissions of aircraft by up to 80%, as widely touted. With jet engines burning fossil fuels, aviation accounted for 2% of all carbon exhaust in 2022, a slice that will widen rapidly unless this sector finds a way to decarbonize. Electric planes of jetliner size remain a challenge of technology. They would need very light-weight batteries. As take-offs demand enormous thrust, an airframe design that can get airborne on electric power remains a steep ask. Until key breakthroughs are made, there will be no estimated-time-of-arrival for clean air travel. Hence, the industry’s best bet right now for carbon neutrality is the adoption of SAFs (combined with carbon capture). This is a transition that the GBA aims to accelerate.

The SAF-led path to carbon neutrality, however, is unlikely to be smooth, strewn as it will be with various possible air pockets. Consider SAF supply capacity. Biofuels typically require vast quantities of agricultural produce. Ethanol yielding crops like sugarcane and corn are used for it and their acreage has been increasing across the world. Yet, as it involves a diversion of farm resources away from primary purposes like nutrition, output constraints will kick in sooner than we’d like. Thankfully, other kinds of biomass can be used too. The government has indicated that India’s SAF plans are based on making use of bio-waste—like used cooking oil, forest residue and agricultural and municipal refuse—apart from non-food crops. Even so, feedstock sufficiency will be hard fought. The idea is to start with a blend of very little biofuel—say 1%—mixed with regular jet fuel, and then gradually raise the bio-content as SAF-adapted aircraft come along. READ MORE