The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has urged governments meeting at the 42nd International Civil Aviation Organisation’s (ICAO’s) assembly in Montreal, Canada, to increase support for sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), Forbes reported.
According to IATA, which represents 350 airlines comprising over 80% of global air traffic, an inadequate supply of SAF is the aviation industry’s biggest hurdle to decarbonisation.
“SAF is absolutely critical to the industry achieving its net zero CO₂ emissions by 2050,” said IATA director general Willie Walsh during a press briefing ahead of the ICAO meeting, being held on 23 September-3 October.
“We’re disappointed at the progress that has been made in relation to the production of SAF … the problem … is one of supply and not one of demand.”
IATA has urged governments to provide direct incentives to producers, harmonise global standards and reaffirm the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA) as the only international framework for carbon offsetting.
The global market for SAF is small - about US$2.9bn in 2025 compared to the US$239bn global market for conventional aviation fuel, Reuters wrote on 16 September, citing analysis firm SkyQuest Technology Group.
However, additional SAF demand could result in the expansion of cattle herds and directly or indirectly drive deforestation and forest degradation, the news agency wrote, finding in an investigation that US firm Diamond Green Diesel (DGD) had been purchasing tallow from cattle raised on illegally cleared lands in the Amazon rainforest to produce renewable diesel and SAF.
DGD is a joint venture between renderer Darling Ingredients and petroleum refiner Valero Energy and operates a renewable diesel and SAF refinery in Port Arthur, Texas.
Its imports from Brazil had been certified as sustainable by the International Sustainability and Carbon Certification (ISCC), a third-party certification body that approved Diamond's plant for CORSIA, Reuters wrote.
To be eligible, biomass used for fuel cannot come from land deforested after 2008 or protected areas, but the ISCC told Reuters it did not investigate Diamond's supply chain because it considered tallow a "byproduct" of the beef industry under CORSIA.
IATA said it had always given its support to the use of sustainable feedstocks for SAF.
“Feedstock is not the hindrance for us reaching the 500M tonnes of SAF that we need in 2050,” said IATA chief economist and senior vice president for sustainability, Marie Owens Thomsen during the IATA briefing. “The main bottleneck is how quickly we can mature and bring the technologies to commercial viability.”
