“For the first time, companies including Bank of America, Boom Supersonic, Boston Consulting Group, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Meta and clean energy nonprofit RMI are joining together through the Sustainable Aviation Buyers Alliance (SABA) to purchase sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) certificates at scale. This leap forward from previous individual SAF certificate purchases by corporations dramatically strengthens the demand signal aviation customers are sending to the SAF market.”
SABA is a joint initiative of RMI, and the Environmental Defense Fund focused on accelerating the path to net-zero aviation through the development and use of SAF. SAF is a drop-in fuel made with renewable or waste feedstocks. Compared to conventional jet fuel, the World Energy-produced SAF utilized in these SABA certificate purchases could reduce lifecycle carbon emissions by 84%.
The premium cost of SAF in comparison to fossil jet fuel means that this initiative needs to be supported by many stakeholders in order to lower the cost and meet the net zero goals. Decarbonizing aviation is only possible through widespread collaboration, and SABA expects to increase its annual collective demand by 10 times the amount from the first process with the launch of their second competitive procurement process. With a five-year timeline set, the second process will be open to all airlines and fuel providers.
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