Airline Places Order for Sustainable Aviation Fuel Made From Human Waste

A Wizz Air Airbus A320 aircraft approaches landing at Eindhoven Airport EIN, the Netherlands on July 19, 2023. Nicolas Economou / NurPhoto via Getty Images

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Wizz Air, a budget airline based in Hungary, has placed an order for sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) made from human waste.

The SAF is developed by a Bristol, UK-based startup, Firefly, which has come up with a way to turn treated sewage into fuel. Wizz Air recently placed an order for up to 525,000 metric tons of SAF for over the next 15 years from Firefly as a way of investing in the idea, The Guardian reported.

“Alongside fleet renewal and operational efficiency, sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) plays a crucial role in reducing carbon emissions from aviation,” Yvonne Moynihan, corporate and ESG officer at Wizz Air, shared in a press release. “Our investment in Firefly, which has the potential to reduce our lifecycle emissions by 100,000 tonnes CO2-eq per year, underscores our commitment to mainstream the use of SAF in our operations by 2030.”

According to the International Energy Agency, the aviation industry is responsible for about 2% of global carbon emissions, but advancements such as SAF can reduce the impact of air travel. However, as The Guardian reported, developing SAF can be cost- and resource-restrictive. It can be more expensive to develop than conventional aviation fuel, and many SAFs rely on materials with limited stocks, such as spent cooking oil or other food waste.

But Firefly noted that there is a large source of biosolids from treated sewage that otherwise has little value and could be less expensive to turn into SAFs compared to other materials. The sewage sludge can also be blended with up to 50% conventional fuel made from kerosene without needing to redesign or modify aircraft engines, Yahoo! Finance reported.

Firefly’s fuel is still undergoing regulatory testing, but the company has plans to construct a factory for its operations in Harwich in Essex, England, Yahoo! Finance reported. Anglian Water, a utility company, has agreed to supply the biosolids for the facility to turn into SAF. Firefly said it expects to start supplying the SAF by 2028 or 2029.

In addition to helping the airline meet its goal of powering 10% of flights with SAF by 2030, the order for Firefly’s SAF could also help Wizz Air meet the EU’s regulations, which will require 20% SAF for flights starting in the EU by 2030 and 70% SAF by 2050.

“However, achieving our aspiration requires a significant ramp-up of SAF production and deployment,” Moynihan said. “Therefore, we call on policymakers to address barriers to SAF deployment at scale by incentivising production, providing price support, and embracing additional sustainable feedstocks for biofuel production.”

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