Following the successful Q&A roundtable discussion on the future of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) in December 2020, I decided to do a video podcast series with several SAF producers and technology developers to get their insight into the future of SAF. For this video podcast, I spoke to Jimmy Samartzis, CEO of LanzaJet, about the company’s scale up plans and the future of the SAF industry in general. Following are several excerpts from our discussion, which you can view or download below, or listen to in ITunes.
“We’ve been public about the fact that we want to see SAF in the marketplace. We think it has a very important place in aviation and in the evolving consumer mindset as well, in terms of traveling sustainably. So, our goal has been to get to a hundred million gallons of production by 2025. I would say that we are well on our way. In the early part of January, we announced a new project in central Europe where our LanzaJet technology will be leveraged for a new biorefinery there. Between the work we’re doing in Georgia, the work in central Europe, the projects that our shareholders have committed to by 2025, we fully anticipate that we will have at least a hundred million gallons of hydrocarbons made from sustainable ethanol in the market by 2025.”
“From my perspective, it feels like we are truly at an inflection point for the industry. It seems that we have airlines who are firmly behind getting to net zero. We have governments who are also supporting us, through policy mechanisms and other programs, and helping us commercialize. Consumer mindset is shifting as well, not only in traditional parts of the globe, but in others where it has come much further along in this COVID environment that we’ve been in. And technology, most importantly, is actually at a point where it can scale up. There are some proven technologies, including ours, that are right at that tipping point where we can start to develop significant volumes of SAF.
I expect that within the next 10 years, we will have made a good dent in the need for SAF, but it’s not an easy path, right? There are important attributes that need to continue to develop and to fall into place, including policy mechanisms to support the commercialization of it. As we come out of COVID and as we return to an environment across the globe where people are traveling again, the commitments that are being made by not only airlines, but their corporate customers as well to get to net zero are creating the right pressure points and the right demand and the right structure of incentives and support to help us get there.”
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