The European aviation ecosystem has come together in developing an urgently needed action plan to unlock Final Investment Decisions for e-SAF projects in Europe
Today, following months of extensive collaboration, technical workshops and analysis with our members, we are excited to share our Insights Report ‘Accelerating the Take-off for e-SAF in Europe’. Project SkyPower has united 13 high-profile CEOs and over 40 leading organisations from across the European aviation ecosystem with a shared vision of making e-SAF a commercial reality this decade, bringing the European aviation industry a vital step closer to a lower emissions future.
With two-thirds of the global e-SAF pipeline located in Europe and decades of expertise in the chemicals and fuels industry, the region is poised to lead the way on scaling this crucial technology - but no e-SAF plant has yet reached Final Investment Decision (FID). With 3–4-year construction periods, the industry faces a critical window of less than two years to bring first-of-a-kind e-SAF plants to FID, or risk missing 2030 regulated SAF blending mandates. Our modelling shows that this requires EUR 15–25 billion of capital investment between now and 2030, as well as bridging an annual premium to fossil jet fuel of EUR 3-5 billion by 2030. A thriving e-SAF industry could secure millions of aviation jobs, have spillover benefits to other sectors by driving innovation in power-to-X and carbon capture technology and create a major market opportunity for Europe to export its innovations worldwide.
Yet, to reach commercial-scale e-SAF production by 2030, a collective step-change is needed from producers, incumbent fuel suppliers, offtakers, financiers, policymakers, and public finance organisations.
Our new report lays out a 10-point action plan to unlock FIDs, with four critical objectives:
- Ensure regulatory certainty of e-SAF mandates and penalties
- Bridge the premium between e-SAF and fossil jet fuel with public funding via existing industry taxation while the technology scales.
- Secure long-term demand for e-SAF at a price that addresses the economic challenges of the new fuel.
- Mitigate first-of-a-kind e-SAF project risk to unlock commercial capital.
You can download the report and read the full press release using the links below.