Pragmatic assessment of meeting the 2030 U.S. sustainable aviation fuel goal

Abstract

Sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) production is essential for decarbonizing the aviation sector in the short and mid-term as well as maintaining the global competitiveness of U.S. airlines, supporting job creation, and ensuring U.S. energy independence. The near-term U.S. SAF target, set by the SAF Grand Challenge, is 11.4 billion liters (3 billion gallons) of domestic SAF production by 2030, with a minimum 50 % reduction in lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions. In 2024 U S. SAF production was less than 2 % of the stated goal, demonstrating that the remaining production growth is significant. Barriers to scale-up include technological readiness, feedstock availability, and delays in facility development. This study uses a database of U.S. SAF production announcements to assess the feasibility of attaining the 2030 targets by analyzing production potential, construction paradigms, feedstock availability, and CO2 abatement cost. Our analysis indicates that the hydroprocessed esters and fatty acids pathway will dominate U.S. SAF production through 2030, with notable contributions from alcohol to jet and co-processing. However, probable U.S. production of SAF is predicted to fall short of the current goal by 3.6-billion liters although there are scenarios that meet the goal. Existing U.S. policies favor on-road transportation fuels and are insufficient to drive necessary SAF production scale-up. Additional measures, such as non-government scope 3 emission purchases, long-term incentives, a national low-carbon fuel standard, or volume mandates, are options to close the gap. These measures are needed to ensure the profitability of SAF production and competitiveness with renewable diesel.[Display omitted]•U.S. SAF production will be dominated by HEFA through 2030.•SAF production in the U.S. is expected to fall short of the near-term goal of 11.4 billion L/yr.•Further growth of the nascent SAF industry will require additional supportive measures