SINGAPORE – National carrier Singapore Airlines (SIA) and its low-cost arm, Scoot, will buy 1,000 tonnes of green jet fuel from Finnish energy giant Neste as the airline group looks to fulfil its promise of achieving net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.
The carriers will be the first at Changi Airport to receive sustainable aviation fuel produced at Neste’s refinery in Tuas South. It will also be the first time that Neste is supplying the fuel directly to airlines at the airport instead of through an intermediary, the companies said.
Made from renewable waste and residue raw materials such as used cooking oil, the greener fuel will be blended with conventional jet fuel by Neste according to the required safety specifications. The blend will then be delivered to SIA and Scoot planes via Changi Airport’s existing fuel hydrant system.
Neste and SIA Group said on May 6 that the blended fuel will be delivered in two batches, in the second and fourth quarters of 2024.
The order marks the first step taken by SIA Group towards achieving its target of having sustainable aviation fuel form 5 per cent of its overall fuel consumption by 2030.
The 1,000 tonnes of green jet fuel to be purchased are a small fraction of what the airline group uses in a year. Before the Covid-19 pandemic, SIA Group flights used more than 5 million tonnes of jet fuel annually.
While it now costs three to five times the price of regular jet fuel and there is limited supply, sustainable aviation fuel has been touted as the most promising solution to lower the aviation sector’s carbon emissions in the near term, with claims that it can reduce flight emissions by up to 80 per cent when compared with traditional fuel.
SIA Group previously conducted a 20-month sustainable fuel trial with the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore (CAAS) and Temasek-owned investment platform GenZero. It showed that the greener fuel can be supplied to planes here safely without the need to modify existing airport infrastructure.
In the trial, which lasted from February 2022 to September 2023, the airline group also bought 1,000 tonnes of green jet fuel from Neste, but with the blending and delivery done by US oil and gas giant ExxonMobil.
It was only in May 2023 that Neste completed the expansion of its Singapore refinery, which now has the capacity to produce a million tonnes of sustainable jet fuel yearly, making it the world’s largest production facility for green aviation fuel.
It was also only then that Neste inked an agreement to establish a direct supply chain from its Tuas refinery to Changi Airport.
SIA Group said that with its latest purchase of sustainable jet fuel, it will offer carbon offsets to corporate travellers, shippers and freight forwarders.
Called “book and claim units”, 1,000 of these credits will be sold, each representing 1 tonne of sustainable fuel and its associated carbon dioxide reduction.
In its trial, SIA Group also generated 1,000 sustainable aviation fuel credits but sold only about two-thirds of them. CAAS said last November that more work was needed to raise awareness here about the use of sustainable aviation fuel credits as a tool to reduce carbon footprints.
Mr Alexander Kueper, Neste’s vice-president for renewable aviation, said he is hopeful that SIA Group’s latest order of green jet fuel and the recent announcement of Singapore’s national sustainable jet fuel targets will encourage wider adoption of sustainable fuel across the Asia-Pacific region.
He said: “We are looking forward to expanding our cooperation with Singapore Airlines as well as supplying visiting carriers at Changi Airport.”
In February, the Government set a national target for sustainable jet fuel to constitute 1 per cent of all jet fuel used at Changi Airport and Seletar Airport in 2026, with the eventual goal of 3 per cent to 5 per cent use by 2030.
Travellers flying out of Singapore will also need to pay an additional levy from 2026, with the money collected going towards the bulk purchase of greener jet fuel that airlines here will need to use.
Besides SIA and Scoot, other airlines have bought sustainable jet fuel for use at Changi Airport.
In October 2023, Dubai-based carrier Emirates inked a deal with Neste for the supply of more than 11 million litres of blended sustainable aviation fuel. This is to supply its flights leaving Changi Airport and Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport in 2024 and 2025.
