BA's parent company, International Airlines Group, has signed an agreement to purchase 785,000 tonnes of sustainable aviation fuel produced using energy-to-liquid technology.
Known as eSAF, the fuel is made from CO2, water and renewable energy, unlike standard SAF, which is made from a variety of feedstocks including cooking oil, municipal waste and agricultural waste.
The 14-year contract with California-based producer Twelve, which has “developed and patented a proprietary process that can produce high-quality synthetic fuels from renewable electricity and CO2,” will allow IAG to receive the eSAF “from 2025”. .
Twelve has collaborated with IAG since 2020, when it joined the group's Hangar 51 startup accelerator program.
IAG is the first European airline group to announce an eSAF agreement, meaning the group has now reached a third of its goal to operate 10 percent of flights with SAF by 2030.
IAG says it bought about 12 percent of global SAF supply in 2023.
Last summer IAG and Microsoft announced what they said was “the largest co-financed purchasing agreement for sustainable aviation fuel emissions reduction globally, where both parties finance part of the cost of supply.”
And in November, British Airways announced it had secured £9 million in funding for its sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) partnership called Project Speedbird.
The airline is working with Teesside-based cleantech company Nova Pangea Technologies and leading ethanol for SAF technology company LanzaJet, with the project planned to produce 102 million liters of SAF per year by 2028.
BA's Project Speedbird SAF partnership secures £9m government funding
Commenting on the news, Luis Gallego, CEO of IAG, stated:
“We have a roadmap to achieve net zero emissions by 2050, including a goal to fly on 10 percent sustainable aviation fuel by 2030. Global sustainable fuel shortages remain an issue for our industry, although companies Innovators like Twelve are an important part of the solution.
“This new agreement will contribute to our 2030 SAF target. We would like to see similar projects at scale in Europe and look forward to working with the governments of our key markets to build a SAF industry that generates jobs, economic growth and a stable supply of SAF” .
In October, Lufthansa signed a letter of intent with organizations including Airbus and Munich Airport for “extensive research collaboration on Power-to-Liquid (PtL) aviation fuels.”
The agreement, which also involves MTU Aero Engines and the German Aerospace Center (DLR), aims to accelerate the technology selection, market introduction and industrial scale-up of PtL aviation fuels in Germany.
Lufthansa partners with Airbus and Munich Airport for Power-To-Liquid fuel research
iairgroup.com, twelve.co
