Australian Renewable Energy Agency funds Ampol, GrainCorp SAF studies

The Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) is looking to cut emissions in Australia’s skies with up to AUD$14.1 million (USD$8.9 million) in funding announced Dec. 17 for two projects from its sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) funding initiative.

ARENA is providing AUD$8 million (USD$5.1 million) in funding to Ampol and AUD$6.1 million (USD$3.9 million) to GrainCorp for separate studies to develop renewable fuel alternatives for Australia’s airline industry.

ARENA CEO Darren Miller said these projects represent an important step towards developing a pipeline of projects that could support the reduction of aviation-sector emissions.

“Aviation is a persistently challenging industry from an emissions-reduction perspective,” Miller said. “With Australians being among the most prolific flyers in the world, decarbonizing this high-emissions industry will be vital for us to achieve our net-zero targets. These two projects are an important step towards developing opportunities to cut emissions from Australian skies and ARENA will be working to ensure the lessons from these projects help inform the broader development of the SAF industry in Australia.”

The two projects include:

• AUD$8 million (USD$5.1 million) to Ampol for the AUD$30.2 million (USD$19.2 million) Brisbane Renewable Fuels pre-FEED study, which will investigate developing a renewable fuels facility of greater than 450 million liters (119 million gallons) per year for SAF and renewable diesel production at the company’s Lytton refinery. 450 million liters of SAF would be equivalent to almost 5 percent of 2019 (pre-COVID) fossil jet-fuel consumption. The funding will support Ampol to undertake its pre-FEED engineering for Ampol’s Brisbane Renewable Fuels facility.

• AUD$6.1 million (USD$3.9 million) to GrainCorp for the AUD$19.8 million (USD$12.6 million) SAF oilseed-crushing facility predeployment study to investigate the establishment of an oilseed-crushing facility that, in alignment with GrainCorp’s feasibility assessment, may produce a minimum of 330,000 tons per year of canola oil as a feedstock input for SAF production. This represents approximately 12 percent of the 6.13 million tons of canola exported from Australia in the past year to Sept. 30. The funding will occur over two stages, first for pre-FEED engineering and then, subject to review, FEED engineering.

Ampol and GrainCorp, along with IFM Investors, recently entered a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to explore the establishment of an integrated renewable fuels industry in Australia.

“This funding will further Ampol’s investigations into establishing a domestic renewable fuels capability, which could create benefits in energy security, support regional development and stimulate agriculture and manufacturing industries,” said Matt Halliday, the managing director and CEO of Ampol. “The combination of Ampol’s existing liquid-fuels infrastructure and capabilities, the expertise of our MOU partners IFM Investors and GrainCorp along with ongoing government support has the potential to create a national renewable fuels ecosystem and unlock Australia’s competitive advantage in infrastructure, technical expertise and the availability of raw materials.”

GrainCorp CEO Robert Spurway highlighted that the funding will support ongoing efforts to expand the company’s leading oilseed-crush capacity.

“GrainCorp is advancing plans to scale up our oilseed-crush operations, recognizing the critical role of feedstocks in a renewable fuels supply chain,” he said. “Our feasibility work focuses on proximity to oilseed sources, fuel-refining capacity, customer demand and export potential for canola meal. In partnership with Ampol and IFM Investors, we are committed to supporting the establishment of a domestic supply chain for SAF as a vital step towards decarbonizing Australia’s aviation sector.”

Domestic aviation accounts for approximately 2 percent of Australia’s greenhouse-gas emissions and is viewed as a hard-to-abate sector, with the bulk of emissions from medium- to long-haul flights.

This emissions impact is even higher when considering Australia’s international aviation emissions.

ARENA’s SAF funding initiative was launched in 2023 with AUD$30 million (USD$19 million) to support the development of a domestic SAF industry considering short- and medium-term solutions to emissions reduction for Australia’s aviation industry.

This brings ARENA’s total investment to AUD$23 million (USD$14.6 million) across three projects with more investments to be announced beyond the previously allocated AUD$30 million.

The SAF funding initiative builds on the findings of ARENA’s 2021 Bioenergy Roadmap, which found that SAF produced from renewable biomass could provide up to 19 percent of Australia’s aviation-fuel requirements by 2030.