Singapore to have world's largest sustainable aviation fuel output capacity

SINGAPORE would have the world’s largest sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) production capacity when Finnish producer Neste’s facility in Tuas is completed in the first quarter of 2023.

Neste is now the top SAF producer globally in terms of output and capacity, with an annual production capacity of 100,000 metric tonnes in its facility in Finland.

It will be able to roll out as much as 1 million metric tonnes of SAF a year at its 1.5 billion euro (S$2.2 billion) Tuas refinery next year, making Singapore Neste’s main SAF production site.

SAF is a fuel produced from renewable raw materials, such as used cooking oil or animal fat from food-industry waste. It meets all quality and performance requirements of conventional fossil fuels, but costs 3 to 5 times more. It has been identified by the International Air Transport Association (IATA) as a key factor to the aviation industry achieving its emissions-reduction goals.

Sami Jauhiainen, Neste’s vice-president of renewable aviation in the Asia Pacific, told The Business Times: “We are seeing growing demand for SAF from the airlines, which have put in place increasingly ambitious sustainability targets, and we see that regulations (mandates and incentives) are creating a growing market for SAF in Europe, North America and also in the Asia Pacific region.”

Singapore is the hub of Neste’s renewable production and commercial activities in the Asia Pacific. Neste's first investment in Singapore was a renewable diesel refinery, in 2007; that was at the time its largest investment in renewable refining. The SAF plant will be next to that renewable diesel refinery.

Neste’s orders, tracked by International Civil Aviation Organization from publicly available information, include that for 1.25 million litres of neat SAF (sustainable fuels that are unmixed or undiluted) to be supplied to ExxonMobil to be blended for use under a pilot by the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore, Singapore Airlines (SIA), and state investor Temasek.

It was estimated by the Iata - a trade association representing some 290 airlines - that 100 million litres of SAF would be produced in 2021.