EBB: how to strengthen EU industrial leadership in bioSAF

In India, BioEnergy Times reported that the European Biodiesel Board (EBB) published its policy priorities to accelerate investments, scale up production and increase the competitiveness of bioSAF in the EU. The EBB represents European producers of Biodiesel (FAME and HVO) and bio-based aviation fuel (HEFA). 

The association stresses that maintaining the overall ambition of EU aviation decarbonization policies is essential to ensure investment certainty and deliver emissions reductions, but that improvements can be made – particularly to the ReFuelEU Aviation Regulation.

In its paper, the EBB advocates for a framework that provides regulatory certainty for the years to come. SAF production requires substantial upfront capital, long lead times and a stable framework to reach final investment decisions. SAF projects are highly capital-intensive industrial undertakings. Large jumps in the SAF mandate trajectory (such as from 6% in 2030-2034 to 20% in 2035) do not reflect the industrial reality of how SAF capacity is planned and developed, according to the report.

Therefore, the current five-year steps risk creating periods of temporary misaligning between capacity and mandated demand, followed by abrupt compliance pressure. This severely complicates offtake planning. For this reason, the EBB proposes to complement the existing milestone 5-year targets with a predictable and incremental annual trajectory. This would not alter the overall ambition of the Regulation, but would create a smoother and more investable curve for both producers and airlines.

To grant greater flexibility, the EBB proposes to introduce a ‘SAF surplus and pre-fulfillment’ mechanism within ReFuelEU in addition to an annual incremental increase of SAF targets.