Oneworld airline partners join with Breakthrough Energy Ventures to invest in new SAF technologies

The oneworld Alliance and major airline members, plus a prominent member of the rival Star Alliance have partnered with Breakthrough Energy Ventures (BEV), the green investment platform established by technology billionaire Bill Gates, in a new $150 million investment fund to identify, accelerate and commercialise technologies which deliver affordable supplies of sustainable aviation fuels. Cornerstone investors in the oneworld BEV Fund are the world’s largest airline company, American, and the expanding Alaska Airlines Group, which are joined by Europe’s International Airlines Group (IAG), Hong Kong-based Cathay Pacific and Japan Airlines, all from oneworld, plus marquee outsider Singapore Airlines from Star Alliance. Breakthrough will be the fund’s investment manager, contributing technical expertise and broad experience in backing start-up climate technology companies. The platform’s focus will be “novel, next-generation SAF technologies” and support for a “diverse and resilient” SAF supply chain.

The oneworld BEV Fund is the latest in a string of global initiatives designed to help accelerate SAF production as pressure increases on airlines to reduce their carbon emissions while demand for air travel continues to surge and supply chain disruption delays deliveries of new aircraft and engines, forcing the extended use of older, higher-emitting fleets.

Doubts are also rising about aviation’s capacity to meet ever-growing decarbonisation targets, fuelled in part by emerging shortages of commonly used SAF feedstocks, slow progress in diversifying SAF development pathways, insufficient refineries to meet projected long-term demand and financial challenges for some existing producers.

The oneworld BEV fund will support new fuel technologies that it considers have the greatest potential for both reducing emissions and achieving commercial success.

Initially, only a handful of oneworld’s 15-member carriers will participate, together with Singapore Airlines, though oneworld confirmed “active discussions” were underway with more potential strategic partners and that others were likely to join in coming months.

“Sustainable aviation fuel is essential to addressing the sector’s environmental impact and represents a major commercial opportunity,” said Eric Toone, who is both Managing Partner for Breakthrough Energy Ventures and Chief Technology Officer at Breakthrough Energy.

“The oneworld BEV fund is built to identify and scale breakthrough SAF technologies that can deliver real emissions reductions for jet fuel, compete with fossil-based fuels on cost and integrate seamlessly with today’s aviation infrastructure. These are complex systems-level challenges that will take time to solve, and the fund is built with the long-term vision and staying power to help bring solutions to market.” 

Nat Pieper, oneworld’s CEO, said the partnership with Breakthrough Energy Ventures was “part of oneworld’s strategy to create a future of aviation that solves problems at scale and serves the needs of the greater aviation community. By working together we’ll be better positioned to create long-term solutions for the energy transformation of an industry that is vital to global economic growth.”

American and the rapidly expanding Alaska Air Group, which recently acquired Hawaiian Airlines, are the two anchor airline partners in the oneworld BEV fund.

“By investing in the SAF technologies of the future, American and our oneworld partners are making this business decision to unlock novel technologies with the potential to reach larger scale at lower prices than current technologies can achieve,” said Robert Isom, who is both American’s CEO and Chairman of oneworld.

Alaska Air Group CEO Ben Minicucci said Breakthrough Energy Ventures was “a partner with the scientific, technical and commercial expertise to make effective investment decisions that will create the market for next-generation fuels and power our industry in the years ahead.”

While its new subsidiary Hawaiian is not yet a member of oneworld and is still being integrated into the Alaska Air Group, it is named as a participant in the oneworld BEV programme through its parent. Alaska’s Chief Sustainability Officer, Diana Birkett Rakow, was recently appointed CEO of Hawaiian but will continue to have oversight of the Group’s sustainability and venture investment strategies.

European aviation group IAG, owner of two key oneworld carriers, British Airways and Iberia, reiterated that SAF was the most viable pathway for the aviation industry to achieve net zero targets, but urged greater support from governments to increase production and use of alternative fuels.

“To unlock SAF’s full potential, we are calling for supportive policy frameworks that help attract investment and enable the infrastructure needed to kickstart production,” said IAG CEO Luis Gallego.  

In Asia-Pacific, the largest and fastest-growing aviation region, Cathay Pacific, Japan Airlines and Singapore Airlines have all signed up as launch partners in the new investment platform.

“As an airline with significant long-haul operations, scaling innovation to make SAF more accessible and cost-competitive is critical to Cathay Pacific’s future,” said Cathay Group CEO Ronald Lam.

“This investment reflects our belief that only through collective action across geographies and industries can we build a resilient and scalable SAF ecosystem that delivers meaningful environmental progress and supports the future of our industry. And with Asia continuing to play a pivotal role in the global SAF ecosystem, we’re proud to help lead this momentum from the region.”

Japan Airlines Group CEO Tottori Mitsuko said air connectivity was vital for Japan, an island nation, “thus we believe we have a mission to tackle the environmental impact of air transportation. Working towards this common mission for oneworld, we look forward to promoting technology and the use of SAF together with the member airlines, anticipating expansion into the Asian region in the future.”

The surprise inclusion in the oneworld initiative was Singapore Airlines, a high-profile member of the larger and competing Star Alliance group, whose participation illustrates a shift to collaboration beyond commercial boundaries.

“Our investment in this fund demonstrates Singapore Airlines’ strong support for developing and commercialising next generation sustainable aviation fuels,” said Lee Wen Fen, the airline’s Chief Sustainability Officer.

“Reducing the carbon emissions of jet fuel demands collective action across the entire aviation ecosystem, and such initiatives will drive innovation towards meaningful progress in this crucial energy transformation.”

Photo: Alaska Airlines

Tony Harrington
Correspondent