Decarbonising the skies

Whilst the market is still working out how to push through development fuels under the RTFO in a world where the UK government has a clearly stated requirement for an electric car future, the DfT has begun the push towards the development of sustainable aviation fuels (SAF) using waste feedstocks. There is a clear (and global) need to decarbonise the aviation sector and the governments Green Fuels, Green Skies competition provides a welcome route for future project development.

The Green Fuels, Green Skies competition provides up to £15 million in grant funding to UK SAF projects during the 2021/22 financial year. Specifically, this funding is intended to support the early-stage development of UK SAF plants, referred to as “Front End Engineering Design (FEED)”, “Pre-FEED” and “Feasibility Study” stages of a project’s development life cycle. It will be interesting to see how this capital will be allocated into the market and the successful projects that meet the competition requirements. In our opinion a very welcome start to the future SAF development process.