Sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) brokerage

In practice, whatever ASTM D7566 Annex A2 accepts, because HEFA is the only approved route carrying real volume. That means used cooking oil, category 1 and 2 animal fats, certain vegetable oils and other lipids. The other seven annexes are approved but small: Fischer-Tropsch needs gasified biomass, alcohol-to-jet needs ethanol or iso-butanol, and the algae route barely exists commercially. If someone offers you a SAF offtake for a feedstock no annex accepts, that offtake is not real yet.

Because that is the certification limit for most approved synthetic blending components under ASTM D7566. The blended product is then certified as conventional Jet A-1 under ASTM D1655. The limit exists because pure paraffinic fuel lacks the aromatics that seals in older aircraft fuel systems rely on to swell. That is why 100 % SAF flights are demonstrations rather than routine operations, and it is worth correcting early when a conversation assumes neat SAF into an existing fleet.

ReFuelEU Aviation obliges fuel suppliers at EU airports to blend 2 % from 2025, 6 % by 2030, 20 % by 2035 and 70 % by 2050. Inside that there is a separate synthetic fuel sub-mandate of 1.2 % by 2030 rising to 35 % by 2050. Read the sub-mandate carefully: it is carved out of the total, so the bio-based share grows more slowly than the headline suggests. See our demand outlook.

No, though they are made the same way and often in the same plant. Both are produced by hydrotreating fats and oils. HVO is a diesel-range paraffinic fuel specified under EN 15940; SAF is the kerosene fraction, specified under ASTM D7566 and then D1655. A producer choosing between them is choosing which cut to maximise, and that choice follows the price spread and the mandate, not the chemistry.

Almost never. Airlines buy jet fuel from fuel suppliers, and the mandate sits on the supplier rather than the airline. Your material goes to a refiner or a hydrotreater who produces the SAF component, which then gets blended and certified. Understanding that chain saves a lot of wasted approaches: the person who wants your used cooking oil is three steps upstream of the airline whose name is in the headline.

HEFA, hydroprocessed esters and fatty acids, is the commercially mature route to sustainable aviation fuel, made from the same fats and oils used for HVO. It is certified under ASTM D7566 with a defined maximum blending ratio into conventional jet fuel, and it accounts for the overwhelming majority of SAF trading today.

Aviation fuel suppliers at EU airports must supply a minimum share of SAF: 2 % from 2025, rising to 6 % from 2030 and increasing further thereafter, with a separate sub-obligation for synthetic aviation fuels. It is the main reason SAF is contracted forward rather than bought spot.

Not under current certification. Each ASTM D7566 pathway carries a maximum blending ratio into conventional jet fuel, and once blended within that limit and released, the fuel meets the conventional jet specification and is handled identically. Confirm the limit for the specific pathway rather than assuming one figure applies to all of them.

A structure where a buyer funds SAF physically delivered elsewhere and claims the environmental attribute, used because SAF is scarce and unevenly distributed across airports. It is scheme-specific, the rules differ between ISCC CORSIA, RSB and national systems, so the first question is always what the buyer needs to claim and under which framework.

No, and treating them as interchangeable is a costly mistake. CORSIA is the ICAO global scheme with its own eligibility criteria and certification; ReFuelEU Aviation is an EU supply obligation. A batch that qualifies under one does not automatically qualify under the other, so the framework has to be named before anything else is agreed.

Because demand is mandated and supply is scarce, which attracts speculative offering: volumes that do not exist, pathways that are not certified, and paperwork that will not survive an audit. We decline to forward offers where we cannot establish the pathway, the certification scheme and the chain of custody, in this market that filtering is a large part of what a broker is for.