Black & Veatch joins Bioenergy Australia’s SAF alliance

Black & Veatch, a global leader in critical-infrastructure solutions, has joined Bioenergy Australia’s Sustainable Aviation Fuel Alliance of Australia and New Zealand.

Bioenergy Australia is a national industry association, with over 150 members, committed to accelerating Australia’s bioeconomy.

It founded SAFAANZ to create a collaborative environment to advance SAF production, policy, education and marketing in Australia and New Zealand.

SAF is produced by processing renewable sources such as waste cooking oil, plant oils and agricultural residues for use in commercial airplanes.

The fuel can reduce greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions by up to 80 percent compared to traditional jet fuel.

“Electrification is essential for many pillars of the energy system,” said Bioenergy Australia CEO Shahana McKenzie. “Yet, it is only part of the solution to reducing emissions. Australia’s heavy industries, aviation, marine, agriculture and mining need affordable and immediate decarbonization options, such as renewable fuel. We are excited to work with industry leaders, like Black & Veatch, to identify pathways to produce the fuel affordably and at scale.”

Mick Scrivens, Black & Veatch’s vice president and director for the Australia-Pacific region, added, “As well as decarbonizing the aviation sector, sustainable fuels will decarbonize all transportation forms—people and goods. Joining SAFAANZ means Black & Veatch can meaningfully contribute to the advancement of sustainable fuels in Australia and New Zealand, given our extensive global engineering and construction experience across aviation fuel, methanol to gasoline, biogas and renewable natural gas.”

About 2.5 percent of the world’s total carbon emissions are generated by the global aviation sector.

In Australia, the industry accounts for about 1 percent of the country’s GHG emissions.

The International Air Transport Association estimates that SAF could contribute around 65 percent of the reduction in emissions needed by aviation to reach net zero in 2050.

Presently, demand for SAF exceeds its supply.

Australia, with abundant residue resources, agriculture and waste, has strong potential to meet both domestic and global SAF-supply needs.

To realize its potential, the Australian Renewable Energy Agency set aside AUD$30 million (USD$20 million) in July to facilitate the development of the SAF industry with production from renewable feedstocks available locally.

The Sustainable Aviation Fuels Funding Initiative will assess opportunities across the supply chain from renewable feedstock supply to final fuel production, identifying their requirements to enable and scale a domestic SAF industry.

The wider deployment of SAF will be supported by overcoming barriers, including affordability, competition for feedstocks, sustainability, airport infrastructure and cost-effective scaling of production.

Black & Veatch and DG Fuels LLC recently signed and began a binding agreement for Black & Veatch to perform a front-end loading (FEL-3) engineering report for DG Fuels’ launch project to be located in Louisiana (U.S).

The report involving a possible low-emission fuel manufacturing facility in St. James Parish along the Mississippi River is expected to be completed in eight to nine months, consistent with Washington, D.C.-based DG Fuels’ goal of reaching a final investment decision (FID) on the project in early 2024.

In 2022, Black & Veatch’s revenue was $4.3 billion.