(Adnkronos) – Italian major Eni’s biofuels unit Enilive has begun producing sustainable aviation fuel at its plant in Gela, Sicily, with an annual capacity of 400,000 tonnes, representing nearly one-third of expected European SAF demand next year.
“Eni started investing in this field over a decade ago and Enilive will be among the first companies in the world to produce significant quantities of SAF,” an Eni statement cited Enilive’s chief executive Stefano Ballista as saying on Wednesday.
“By 2026, the SAF plant in Porto Marghera, in the Venice biorefinery, will also be operational, and by 2030 other plants will be commissioned in Italy and abroad,” Ballista said.
Enilive aims to boost its biorefining capacity to over 5 million tonnes per year by 2030 and enhance its ‘optionality’ for SAF production to 1 million tonnes per year by 2026, with further potential to double production by 2030, according to the statement.
These targets will be supported by ongoing projects at the Venice biorefinery and the construction of new biorefineries in Malaysia and South Korea, said the statement.
The Gela biorefinery has the capacity to process 736,000 tonnes of biomass per year, which is primarily derived from waste and residual feedstocks such as used cooking oils, animal fat and by-products from vegetable oil processing.
The “innovative” SAF production in Gela has been made possible by plant modifications, in particular to the isomerisation unit, which has been equipped with a reactor and a product separation section, as well as upgrades to the tank farm and logistics infrastructure, the statement noted.
Investments to improve the feedstock pretreatment section, including the construction of a third degumming line, are nearing completion. These improvements will further enable the diversification of waste and residues feedstocks that can be converted into Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil (HVO) biofuels.
The European Union’s ReFuelEU Aviation Regulation 2023/2405 requires aviation fuel providers to ensure that jet fuel supplied to aircraft operators at each airport in 27-nation bloc contains a growing proportion of SAF.
Under the ReFuelEU Aviation regulation, the required proportion of SAF will increase over five year increments from a minimum 2% from 1 January 2025 to 6% from 2030, 20% from 2035, 34% from 2040, 42 % from 2045, reaching 70% from 2050, the statement said.
In anticipation of a growing demand for SAF, Enilive has since September 2022 signed supply accords with several airlines: deals made possible by the initial SAF production achieved through synergies between the Gela Enilive biorefinery and other Eni facilities, using waste-based feedstocks.
