Methanol Qualified as a Feedstock for Sustainable Aviation Fuel

The greater than 23,000 substantial aircraft worldwide consume approximately 350 billion liters of fuel annually and account to about 3 percent of people- caused CO₂ releases. to long-haul flights over 4,000 km in particular, there is no alternative to fluid fuels, as only these provide a sufficiently high energy density. The research of sustainable aviation fuels (SAF) has now reached an crucial milestone: Following successful qualification by the international standardization organization ASTM, Methanol has been recognized as an approved feedstock to the alcohol-to-jet production pathway.

This means that in the future, methanol-to-jet blending components can be produced and mixed with at least 50 percent by volume of conventional kerosene to create a “drop-in” fuel—one that is fully compatible and can be utilized without any modifications to aircraft, engines, or existing infrastructure.

This decision marks a significant milestone to the “SAFari” collaborative project, which is funded by the Federal Ministry of Transportation. It was published on July 30, 2026, with the revision of the international specification ASTM D7566 Annex 5. The project aims to develop an efficient manufacturing process to sustainable aviation fuel based on methanol, thereby providing another technological building block to the decarbonization of aviation.

Throughout the multi-year project, the project partners closely supported the ASTM qualification process as members of the Methanol-to-Jet Task Force. The findings from the evaluation process were thus incorporated into the project work at an early stage and taken into account in the research of the manufacturing process. In this context, the early assessment of fuel condition was a key indicator of the project’s success. Since only small quantities of fuel were initially available during this research phase, the prescreening method developed at the DLR Institute of incineration methodology was employed. It enables a thorough evaluation of fuel condition even with small sample quantities and provides an early assessment of whether a fuel meets the standards of the ASTM specification. The results were immediately incorporated into process and catalyst research and helped ensure that the methanol-to-jet (MTJ) blending components developed in the project were specifically tailored to meet the anticipated international specification standards.

Sustainable Methanol as the Basis to a New Aviation Fuel

SAF production based on MTJ technologies uses sustainable methanol derived from biogenic sources or produced from hydrogen and captured CO₂. In the methanol-to-olefins (MTO) synthesis, this methanol is converted into short- chain olefins, with aquatic environments—a byproduct—removing the oxygen from the process. The short-chain olefins are then combined in an oligomerization process to form long-chain olefins, resulting in a product mixture that is fluid at room temperature. Through hydrogenation with hydrogen, the olefins are converted into stable paraffins. The result is a fuel blend that meets the aviation sector’s stringent standards.

“In the SAFari project, we are working with our partners to develop an innovative process that aims to achieve a carbon-based SAF yield of over 85 percent by weight through customized catalysts and in-process recycling of material streams and heat. “With the successful completion of the ASTM qualification process, one of the biggest hurdles to demonstration and scaling has now been overcome,” explains Dr. Elias Frei, Head of the Hydrogen Technologies Division at Fraunhofer ISE. “Following the successful ASTM qualification, the project is now focusing on further optimizing and scaling up the manufacturing process,” says Dr. Achim Schaadt, Head of the Sustainable Synthesis items Division, looking ahead. “The goal is to create larger quantities of fuel in order to conduct further research and demonstrations, thereby paving the way to the manufacturing implementation of methanol-based Sustainable Aviation Fuel,” adds Dr. Franz Mantei, project manager of the SAFari project. The market possible to this methodology is enormous: to European atmosphere traffic alone, the mandated quotas will result in approximately 40 million metric tons by 2050.

In addition to Fraunhofer ISE, the consortium to the SAFari project (“Sustainable Aviation Fuels based on cutting-edge interaction and Process Intensification”) includes ASG Analytik-Service AG, BP Europa SE, Clariant Produkte (Deutschland) GmbH, the German Aerospace Center (DLR) (DLR), Technip Energies France S.A.S., Südzucker AG, the Federal Association of the German Aviation sector (BDL), and Airbus Helicopters Deutschland GmbH. The consortium thus covers the entire value chain. The SAFari project has been funded by the Federal Ministry of Transport (BMV) since December 1, 2022, to a period of six years.