Jet Fuel Without Oil: Can Aviation Make Enough?
In August 2026, American Airlines and Infinium delivered a batch of electro sustainable aviation fuel, blended with conventional jet fuel, to a commercial passenger flight from Corpus Christi to Dallas Fort Worth. It is a real milestone, and it is not proof that aviation can run on fuel like this at scale.
This video explains the three main routes to jet fuel that does not start with crude oil: HEFA, refining used cooking oil and animal fat; biomass routes, gasifying or fermenting plant and waste material; and power-to-liquid, building fuel from clean electricity, water and captured carbon dioxide. It traces each one from feedstock to fuel, and explains why burning any of them still releases carbon dioxide at the exhaust - the honest comparison happens upstream, in lifecycle accounting, not at the engine.
Then it turns to why scaling any of these routes is hard: a finite and contested supply of waste oil, the enormous amount of additional clean electricity power-to-liquid fuel needs, and the capital, financing and price gap standing between an announced plant and fuel actually leaving one. It closes by setting IATA's 2026 production figures against the EU's ReFuelEU mandate and company targets like Infinium's Roadrunner plant, labelling each one for what it actually is: a forecast, a legal requirement, or a company's own plan.
In these topics
Chapters
- One flight, a global fuel problem
- From early trials to today's aircraft
- Waste oils become kerosene
- Turning biomass into jet fuel
- Making fuel with electricity
- Why the exhaust still contains CO2
- There is only so much waste
- The clean power constraint
- The refinery and price bottleneck
- What the latest numbers show
- Can aviation make enough?
Sources and credits
Photo credits (Wikimedia Commons)
- Solar photovoltaic array, NREL, public domain research photo: NREL, Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ANREL_Array.jpg
- Wind turbine blade installation at NREL's National Wind Technology Center, Colorado: Photo by Dennis Schroeder – ENERGY.GOV, Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ANational_Wind_Technology_Center_-_Colorado.jpg
- Webberville Solar Farm near Austin, Texas, aerial view: The tdog, CC0 - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AWebberville_Solar_Farm_Near_Austin_Texas_from_the_Air.JPG
- Valero Energy Corporation oil refinery, Port Arthur, Texas (2014): Carol M. Highsmith, Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ADusk_view_of_the_Valero_Energy_Corporation%27s_refinery_in_Port_Arthur%2C_Texas_LCCN2014633835.tif
- Oil refinery aerial view, Gulf of Mexico near Houston, Texas: Carol M. Highsmith, Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AAerial_view_of_oil_refinery_next_to_the_Gulf_of_Mexico_near_Houston%2C_Texas_LCCN2011630532.tif
- Oil refinery storage tanks near Houston, Texas: Carol M. Highsmith, Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ARefinery_storage_tanks_near_Houston%2C_Texas_LCCN2011633531.tif
- Solar panel array (photovoltaic), Mesa Verde Visitor Center, Colorado: Dennis Schroeder - NREL Photographer, Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ASolar_panels_in_the_desert.jpg
Primary sources
- S1 Boeing, Virgin Atlantic and GE Aviation, press release, 24 February 2008 - the London-Amsterdam Boeing 747 biofuel demonstration.
- S2 UK Department for Transport, 28 November 2023 - the Flight100 Heathrow-JFK 100% SAF demonstration.
- S3 EASA, European Aviation Environmental Report 2025 (SAF pathways page) - HEFA, AtJ, Gas+FT, PtL definitions and ASTM blending limits.
- S5 IEA, Renewables 2025: Renewable transport - the 2030 SAF and e-kerosene scenario figures.
- S6 IATA, 'SAF Production Volumes Still Disappointing', 6 June 2026 - the 2026 production, cost and capacity figures, and the Willie Walsh quotation.
- S7 American Airlines and Infinium, joint announcement, 6 August 2026 - the Corpus Christi-DFW flight, Pathfinder and Project Roadrunner.
- S8 European Commission, Regulation (EU) 2023/2405 (ReFuelEU Aviation) - the SAF and synthetic-fuel blending mandate schedule.
- S9 EASA, European Aviation Environmental Report 2025 (SAF prices briefing) - the 3-10x price range.
- S10 Transport & Environment, 'Used Cooking Oil: The Certified Unknown' - the certification audit figure used in chapter 7, checked 11 October 2026.
Not regulated financial advice.