Europe’s Race to Build the Net-Zero Supply Chain: SAF pathways, eFuels, and hydrogen convergence
ReFuelEU Aviation has created one of the world’s strongest demand signals for sustainable aviation fuel. Fuel suppliers at EU airports must meet a 2% SAF share in 2025, rising to 6% in 2030 and 70% by 2050. Synthetic aviation fuels receive their own sub-mandate from 2030, reaching 35% by 2050. The regulation also pulls airports and airlines into the picture, with requirements around fuel availability, reporting and avoiding unnecessary tankering.
That policy certainty gives Europe an advantage, but it does not solve the supply challenge. EASA’s 2025 ReFuelEU Aviation technical report gives a useful snapshot of where the market really stands. In 2024, reported SAF supply in the EU was still only 0.6% of aviation fuel supplied. Of the SAF supplied, 98% was biofuel, mainly used cooking oil, and 69% of feedstocks were imported, with China and Malaysia the largest sources.
Those figures are a reminder that the first phase of SAF deployment has been heavily dependent on HEFA and waste lipid supply chains. HEFA will remain vital, particularly for near-term compliance and early market liquidity, but Europe cannot rely on used cooking oil and animal fats alone to meet its 2030s and 2040s trajectory, particularly as those feedstock export markets begin to scale up their own SAF markets. The next phase will require advanced biofuels, alcohol-to-jet, Fischer-Tropsch, waste-based pathways, eFuels and, eventually, a more mature hydrogen economy.
This is where the SAF conversation starts to merge with wider industrial strategy. eSAF production depends on renewable hydrogen, sustainable carbon sources, low-carbon power, electrolyser deployment, CO₂ infrastructure, certification systems and long-term offtake. Many of those inputs are also needed by shipping, chemicals, steel, refining and other hard-to-abate sectors. Aviation is therefore entering a crowded competition for clean molecules, renewable electricity, biogenic carbon and project finance.
Europe’s challenge is to turn that competition into coordination. Ports, airports, refineries, CO2 and hydrogen hubs, and renewable power corridors all have a role to play. A synthetic fuel project cannot be treated as a standalone aviation asset. It needs access to power, water, electrolysers, carbon, logistics, storage, certification and customers. The same is true, in different ways, for advanced biofuel projects that depend on secure residue supply, pre-treatment, refinery integration, waste collection systems and credible sustainability verification.
The European Commission’s Sustainable Transport Investment Plan, adopted in November 2025, acknowledges the scale of the task. It sets out a roadmap for renewable and low-carbon fuels in aviation and waterborne transport and estimates that more than 20 million tonnes of such fuels, alongside around €100 billion of investment, will be needed by 2035 to meet ReFuelEU Aviation and FuelEU Maritime requirements. The plan also points to EU-level support through InvestEU, Horizon Europe, the Innovation Fund and hydrogen-focused mechanisms.
This investment agenda matters because many projects are currently stuck between strong policy demand and weak commercial bankability. Developers need confidence that buyers will pay a premium for compliant fuel over the long term. Airlines need confidence that supply will arrive at scale and that the cost impact will not undermine competitiveness. Investors need clarity on technology risk, feedstock risk, carbon intensity, revenue support, permitting, grid access and policy durability.
EASA has indicated that the EU could potentially meet the overall 2030 SAF target under realistic and optimistic production scenarios, but synthetic aviation fuel remains a major concern because projects have struggled to reach final investment decision. That is why early-mover coalitions, double-sided auctions, contracts for difference-style mechanisms and other revenue certainty tools are becoming central to the discussion.
The UK is moving in a similar direction through its own policy framework. Its SAF Mandate began in 2025 with a 2% obligation, rising to 10% by 2030 and 22% by 2040. The UK has also been developing a revenue certainty mechanism for domestic SAF production, designed to help projects move beyond announcements and into construction. Across both the EU and UK, the lesson is becoming clear: mandates create demand, but revenue support and infrastructure planning help turn demand into steel in the ground.
The other missing piece is market architecture. Europe will need rigorous but workable systems for tracing fuels, verifying sustainability, reporting lifecycle emissions and managing claims across borders. The administrative burden cannot become so heavy that it slows deployment, but weak accounting would damage trust in the market. This is especially important as SAF moves from a niche procurement exercise to a compliance-driven, multi-pathway fuel system involving airlines, suppliers, airports, corporates and freight customers.
Collaboration across sectors is necessary to enable scale. Airlines cannot build the market alone. Fuel producers cannot finance projects on policy ambition alone. Airports cannot wait until fuels arrive before planning storage and handling requirements. Energy companies cannot treat aviation as a marginal offtake market if SAF and eFuels are to become meaningful parts of their transition strategies. Public authorities, meanwhile, need to align climate ambition with industrial delivery, trade policy and energy security.
Europe has many of the ingredients needed to lead: strong regulation, sophisticated aviation markets, industrial clusters, ports, engineering expertise, sustainability standards and growing demand for low-carbon fuels. It also faces serious constraints: high production costs, slow permitting, renewable power competition, limited domestic feedstocks, uncertain eFuel economics and the risk of relying too heavily on imported supply.