US-headed air carrier JetBlue Airways Inc. (JetBlue), has announced that it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Fidelis New Energy, LLC (Fidelis) to provide JetBlue at least 92 million (US) gallons (≈348 million litres) of blended sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).
The SAF will be supplied from Fidelis’ Grön Fuels GigaSystem biorefinery being developed at the Port of Greater Baton Rouge in Louisiana (LA). This SAF is expected to be delivered over the five-year term with a targeted start date of 2025.
With this MoU, Fidelis’ negative carbon intensity SAF is helping JetBlue advance toward its goal to reach 10 percent of its total fuel usage as SAF on a blended basis by 2030.
JetBlue is proud of our work to champion a more sustainable aviation industry and fly regularly using SAF today. But with SAF being less than 1 percent of our total fuel usage, we need significantly more supply to reach our 2040 net zero targets, said Sara Bogdan, Director of Sustainability and Environmental Social Governance at JetBlue.
JetBlue is the only US carrier to be flying regular domestic flights using both available SAF producers delivering today and continues to support the emerging SAF market with significant commitments as the airline continues to grow its SAF mix.
The SAF from the Grön Fuels GigaSystem is innovatively designed to achieve negative lifecycle carbon intensity by integrating carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) and bioenergy with CCS (BECCS).
With partners like Fidelis and their carbon-negative Grön Fuels GigaSystem, we are not only supplying our own growing SAF needs, we’re sending a powerful signal that significant demand for SAF exists. By introducing negative carbon intensity SAF to our network, we are also taking steps towards reaching true carbon neutrality as an airline, Sara Bogdan said.
North America’s largest purpose-built biorefinery
Designed to be the largest and highest efficiency purpose-built renewable fuels facility in North America, the Grön Fuels GigaSystem will produce an estimated 1 billion gallons (≈ 3.8 billion litres) per year (65 000 barrels per day) of SAF, renewable diesel, and other low-carbon products.
Carbon Negative SAF accelerates the goals of aviation industry participants genuinely committed to decarbonization like JetBlue in a pragmatic and timely manner. We are excited to partner the Grön Fuels GigaSystem with JetBlue for the provision of carbon-negative SAF to achieve its environmental goals, said Dan Shapiro, Co-Founder, and CEO of Fidelis.
Grön Fuels further enhances its efficiency and industry-leading carbon intensity by capturing waste process heat to generate power, producing biogas from byproducts, and using its highly flexible processing capabilities to produce carbon-negative SAF from a wide array of existing and emerging low-carbon intensity feedstocks.
The aviation industry continues to increase its demand for SAF with JetBlue leading the way. The scale of the Grön Fuels GigaSystem will not only help serve this growing need but our commitment to innovative design enables us to do so in the most efficient manner, said Bengt Jarlsjo, Co-Founder and COO of Fidelis.
By vertically integrating three proven decarbonization components to produce carbon-negative SAF, the Fidelis-owned high-capacity carbon sink is expected to permanently sequester roughly 5 million tonnes of biogenic carbon dioxide (CO2) per year from the facility.
