US Energy Secretary Jennifer M Granholm is scheduled to visit Indian Oil Corporation’s (IOC) upcoming sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) manufacturing facility in July, for which the CPSU has tied up with US-based sustainable fuels technology company, LanzaJet.

Sources said that plans are afoot for the visit of the US Energy Secretary to the Panipat refinery to see the SAF manufacturing facility’s progress next month. She is also scheduled to participate in the 4th G20 Energy Transitions Working Group Meeting on July 19-20.

IOCL has planned an 86,800 tonnes per annum (TTPA) SAF manufacturing facility at Panipat using LanzaJet’s ATJ technology. The production of sustainable fuel is expected by 2026.

IOC-LanzaJet agreement

The MoU with the US-based sustainable fuels producer, signed during the India Energy Week in February this year, will explore producing SAF in India.

The partnership aims to pursue large-capacity SAF production using Alcohol-to-Jet (ATJ) technology. Both firms are also working on expanding the partnership with a Joint Venture (JV) in India to deploy the LanzaJet technology.

The ATJ technology converts ethanol to Synthetic Paraffinic Kerosene and Synthetic Paraffinic Diesel. It can process any sustainable ethanol source, including ethanol produced from municipal solid waste (MSW), agricultural residues, industrial off-gases and biomass.

SAF in India

In May 2023, Oil Minister H S Puri said that India has feedstock for the potential production of 19-24 million tonnes (MT) of SAF per year, whereas the estimated maximum requirement, considering a 50 per cent blend, is around 8-10 MT annually by 2030.

SAF can help airlines cut emissions significantly. In 2019, India’s civil aviation sector consumed around 8 MT of ATF and emitted around 20 MT of greenhouse gasses.

By 2025, if India targets to blend 1 per cent SAF in jet fuel, then the country will require around 14 crore litres of SAF every year, while the target is for 5 per cent, the requirement will be around 70 crore litres annually, he had said.

Last month, India’s first commercial passenger flight using indigenously produced SAF was flown by AirAsia India from Pune to New Delhi. The blend of SAF was supplied by IOCL in partnership with Praj Industries. The SAF blending with ATF was up to 1 per cent (0.57 per cent).

Previously, Spicejet operated a demonstration flight with 25 per cent SAF (produced from Jatropha seeds by the Indian Institute of Petroleum, CSIR lab) blended with ATF from Dehradun to Delhi in August 2018. In February 2022, Indigo carried out its first international ferry flight with 10 per cent blended fuel from Toulouse to Delhi. A year later in March, Vistara carried out a 30 per cent blended SAF ferry flight from Seattle to Delhi.

IOCL will also form a joint venture with Praj Industries to produce a variety of biofuel. The production of SAF is likely to be the first project out of this JV.

State-run Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals also plans to build a bio-ATF pilot plant at Mangalore using CSIR-Indian Institute of Petroleum’s technology using non-edible oils and used cooking oil as feedstock.

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