Latvian national airline airBaltic marks 1 year of enhanced SAF usage

Photo: airBaltic

Since May 2023, Latvian national airline airBaltic has been offering passengers the voluntary option to participate in achieving climate-neutrality goals by opting additionally for sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).

During the first year of operation, nearly 16,000 passengers from various countries have purchased SAF as an ancillary product, directly facilitating demand for sustainable fuel and highlighting the continuous growth of interest in sustainable aviation.

These contributions have resulted in the use of 18 metric tons of SAF being utilized by airBaltic in May 2024 on flights routing from Spain to Latvia.

The aircraft were refueled with SAF provided by Cepsa at the Madrid, Barcelona and Málaga airports.  

“At airBaltic, we use only fuel recognized by the European Commission,” said Andris Zdors, head of fuel procurement and operations at airBaltic. “We would like to thank our partner Cepsa for assisting in fulfilling our pledge to our customers. The SAF we uplifted is sourced from used cooking oil feedstock and complies with the European Commission’s ReFuelEU regulation and legislation.”

Alvaro Macarro, Cepsa’s director of sustainable aviation, added, “Through collaborations like these, we continue to promote the use of sustainable fuel for aviation in the European market and reinforce our commitment with circular-economy objectives. Our aim is to lead SAF production in Spain and Portugal this decade to promote more sustainable aviation and help airlines advance their decarbonization goals.”

In June 2024, airBaltic began offering passengers the option to add even larger amounts of SAF to their flights.

“We validated our customers' willingness to voluntarily add SAF, observing consistent interest in this initiative,” said Zita Barānova, head of sustainability at airBaltic. “The upcoming European Commission mandate will require 2 percent SAF usage by 2025. The combined voluntary and mandatory usage of SAF supports the creation of a growing market for SAF, which is one of the key tools on the road to climate-neutral aviation.”

The most popular routes for SAF use were Riga-Helsinki, Copenhagen, Berlin and Tallinn.

A specific amount of SAF can be added to flights by purchasing it along with bookings on the airBaltic homepage. 

airBaltic has divided all routes into four categories by distance and calculated the average fuel consumption for each based on last year’s fuel-consumption statistics.

Passengers can choose to contribute a sum that replaces approximately 2 percent, 10 percent, 50 percent or 100 percent of the flight’s fuel attributed to one traveler with SAF in a particular distance category.

The price of SAF varies depending on the ticket type, starting from 0.96 euros per person per flight.

Starting in 2025, the European Union mandatory annual average SAF consumption will be set at 2 percent, gradually increasing to 70 percent by 2050.

By combining compulsory and voluntary demand for SAF, airBaltic aims to accelerate the supply and uptake of SAF.

Cepsa, currently one of the main manufacturers and suppliers of aviation fuels in the Spanish market, produces SAF from organic waste such as used cooking oils and agricultural waste at its La Rábida Energy Park in Huelva, southern Spain.

Cepsa is already supplying SAF at five of Spain’s main airports and aims to lead the production of SAF in Spain and Portugal with an annual production capacity of 800,000 tons by 2030, enough to fly around the world 2,000 times.