Brazil won an audience-voted competition hosted by SAF Investor to assess promising sustainable aviation fuel-producing nations, with feedstock availability proving decisive in the final against England. The webinar brought together industry representatives arguing the merits of the US, France, Brazil, England and Sweden, comparing biomass resources, energy costs and policy support rather than ranking actual production volumes.
According to SAF Investor, Trevor Best, chief executive and founder of Syzygy Plasmonics, presented Brazil’s sugar cane residues as a major competitive advantage. He said biomass from an average sugar cane processing plant could support annual SAF output of 50,000-100,000 tonnes. Representing France, Haffner Energy chief executive Philippe Haffner said the country produces 300 million tonnes of agricultural biomass, including about 40 million tonnes of residues that could be mobilised annually without competing uses.
The discussion also examined how inputs and financing shape fuel prices. StratX Group founder and managing director Izabela Santos argued that Sweden’s access to some of Europe’s cheapest renewable electricity gives it an advantage in eSAF production. EdyMac managing director Jim Stonecipher highlighted US state and federal tax incentives intended to bring SAF prices low enough to encourage offtake. Feedstock, construction and capital costs were identified as important components of the final price.
For England’s entry, OXCCU chief executive Andrew Symes focused on the UK’s Revenue Certainty Mechanism. As described by SAF Investor, the mechanism would use a fixed strike price per litre, with a levy-funded pool compensating producers when market prices fall below that level. Producers would pay into the fund when prices exceed it. The mechanism aims to support second- and third-generation SAF pathways, with Symes arguing that predictable offtake pricing could help domestic projects secure financing.
The final therefore contrasted Brazil’s feedstock proposition with England’s revenue-support case. SAF Investor’s account stressed that international capital can move towards bankable projects wherever they are located. The discussion identified abundant, affordable feedstock, dependable revenues over the life of project debt and a stable policy environment as central requirements for developing competitive SAF production.