Decarbonising & reducing aviation dependence on fossil fuel requires biofuels. BIO4A will produce at least kt of sustainable biojet for its use in aviation at commercial scale for accelerating its deployment within the aviation sector, increasing their attractiveness and contributing to the achievement of the EU targets. BIO4A targets HEFA pathway from wastes, aiming to move the full value chain from TLR 6 to 7. BIO4A will demonstrate the full value chain, enabling a production capacity of 2-300 kt/y of biojet in a First Of A Kind new biorefinery in France. The fuel will be distributed using the existing infrastructures and conventional aircraft fuelling systems for commercial flights. Special attention will be directed to the supply of sustainable feedstock, focusing on waste streams (UCO). In parallel, long-term R&D work will address marginal land in EU MED (low ILUC biofuels). Relevant environmental (inc. GHG and energy balance), economic and social data (inc. health and safety issues, impacts and benefits) will be assessed against targets. Since the current main barrier to the commercial production of biojet is the price gap, BIO4A will explicitly address performance and cost targets vs. relevant key performance indicators. The final goal is to prove the business case, identifying potential issues of public acceptance, market or regulatory risks and barriers (feedstock, technological, business, process) along the entire value chain, taking advantage of previous projects and proposing potential mitigation solutions. Offtake agreements have been signed with KLM and Airfrance. Additional off-take agreements could also be signed to open the participation to more airlines. Regulatory framework is also limiting today the development of the sector and an additional goal is recommendations to policies makers. The proposal will be defined at EU/National level, involving the major sector stakeholders and opening with a profitable dialogue with Member States and the EC.

HIGFLY will develop the next generation of technologies for the production of advanced bio jet fuels from abundant and sustainable biomass feedstocks. In a nutshell, HIGFLY: 1. Utilises abundant and sustainable feedstocks (e.g. second-generation biomass and macroalgae), focusing on feedstock flexibility and synergies across the bioenergy sector. 2. Develops innovative, highly-efficient and scalable reactor and separation technologies to produce advanced bio jet fuels in a resource, energy and cost-effective manner. 3. Develops new and robust catalytic materials and sustainable solvents for the renewable energy sector. 4. Advances the knowledge of its innovative technologies by evaluation of the entire value chain (from feedstock(s) to bio jet fuel) to demonstrate the environmental, social and techno-economic performance of HIGFLY technologies and the prospect of regulatory compliance of HIGFLY’s bio jet fuel. HIGFLY will develop and demonstrate in a step-wise approach and under industrially relevant conditions (at TRL3-4) innovative and highly efficient conversion technologies and integrative approaches to valorise abundant and sustainable feedstocks in a resource-, energy- and cost-effective manner. This has the unique potential to increase the total share of advanced biofuels in the EU jet fuel market. In this way, HIGFLY addresses EU priorities for decarbonizing the transport sector through the key actions of the EU SET Plan, specifically: i) by sustaining technological leadership through development of highly performant renewable technologies and their integration in the EU energy system; ii) by reducing the cost of key technologies through maximizing resource and energy efficiency; and iii) by strengthening market uptake through intensive early-stage cooperation between key end-users, policy advisors and technology developers. The HIGFLY consortium combines experts along the entire value chain, from research to end users, to accelerate market uptake.

REWOFUEL goal is to demonstrate the performances, reliability, environmental and socio-economic sustainability of the entire value chain, for the transformation of residual soft-wood into hydrolysate (RWH), conversion of RWH into bio-Isobutene (bio-IBN) by fermentation and further conversion to biofuels. To achieve these goals a team of 11 partners, leaders in their field, originating from 7 EU-member states, will join efforts. REWOFUEL consists in showcasing the value chain, from residual wood to 3 high performance drop-in biofuels derived from bio-IBN. These biofuels are full-bio-ETBE, bio-isooctane and bio-isododecane rich biofuels. This large market is today supplied entirely by products derived from fossil-based IBN. Products derived from bio-based IBN, using the same process as fossil-based IBN, would provide a true renewable alternative. REWOFUEL includes the development & up-scaling of this process and the valorization of coproducts: lignin, microbial biomass, biogas and fertilizers. To this end, four ambitious objectives were defined: -Demonstrate the production of residual wood hydrolysate (RWH) and establish a quality standard to feed the IBN fermentation unit, -Demonstrate the production of bio-IBN-based biofuels from RWH at pre-commercial scale, -Demonstrate the valorization of lignin and other coproducts resulting from the RWH process, -Determine and validate the targeted technical, safety, economic as well as environmental/social sustainability performances to be achieved for a commercial plant. This project aligns with the core innovation strategies of 2 SMEs which are: deconstructing of wood (SEKAB, SWE) and conversion of sugars/hydrolysates into bio-IBN (GBE, FR). These 2 SMEs are already operating a demo plant that they intend to further upgrade within the project. Related Work packages, tasks, milestones and risks are considered in order to achieve these objectives. REWOFUEL project is fully aligned with the call topic.

FlexJet will build a pre-commercial demonstration plant for the production of advanced aviation biofuel (jet fuel) from waste vegetable oil and organic solid waste biomass (food waste), successfully demonstrating the SABR-TCR technology (traditional transesterification (TRANS) and Thermo-Catalytic Reforming (TCR) combined with hydrogen separation through pressure swing adsorption (PSA), and hydro deoxygenation (HDO) and hydro cracking/ isomerisation (HC)) to produce a fully equivalent jet fuel (compliant with ASTM D7566 Standards). This project will deliver respective environmental and social sustainability mapping and it will validate a comprehensive exploitation business plan, building on already established end user interest with existing offtake agreements already in place with British Airways. The project plant installed at the source of where the waste arises in BIGA Energie at Hohenstein (Germany) will produce 1,200 ton of jet fuel from 3,482 tonnes of dried organic waste and 1,153 tonnes of waste vegetable oil per year. A subsequent scale-up first commercial plant would be constructed immediately after the project end to produce 25,000 tonnes per year of aviation fuel. The FlexJet project consortium has undoubtedly bought together the leading researchers, industrial technology providers including airline off takers and renewable energy experts from across Europe, in a combined, committed and dedicated research effort to deliver the overarching ambition. Building and extending from previous framework funding this project is designed to set the benchmark for future sustainable aviation fuel development and growth within Europe and will provide a real example to the rest of the world of how sustainable aviation biofuels can be produced at both large and decentralised scales economically whilst simultaneously addressing social and environmental needs.