By Nidhi Verma
BENGALURU (Reuters) -Indian Oil Corp will sign an agreement with LanzaJet to produce cleaner aviation fuel at its Panipat refinery in northern India, the state-run refiner’s Chairman S. M. Vaidya told Reuters on Monday.
Chicago, U.S.-based LanzaJet helps companies produce aviation fuel from ethanol manufactured from agricultural or industrial waste, counting Microsoft, the United States Department of Energy, Japan’s Mitsui & Co and Canada’s Suncor Energy as its investors.
By 2030, 2% of aviation fuel produced by Indian Oil will be sustainable aviation fuel, Vaidya told Reuters on the sidelines of the India Energy Week in Bengaluru. The state-run refiner currently does not produce any aviation fuel from ethanol.
Indian Oil already has a tie up with LanzaTech, LanzaJet’s parent company, to convert waste to ethanol, and the LanzaJet deal will help upgrade the ethanol to cleaner jet fuel.
The oil refiner is also in talks with Italy’s Snamprogetti SpA for the conversion of gas pipelines into hydrogen pipelines, Vaidya added.
Unlike the United States and the European Union, India does not have policies governing sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) yet. The European Commission SAF mandate is expected to start in 2025 with a minimum volume of SAF at 2%.
LanzaTech would aim to start producing ethanol-based aviation fuel at the Panipat refinery in 2-3 years, Chief Executive Officer Jennifer Holmgren said.
“We can blend up to 50% (SAF with aviation fuel),” she told Reuters on the sidelines of the energy conference.
(Reporting by Nidhi Verma, Writing by Sudarshan Varadhan; Editing by Rashmi Aich)
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