SAF HAFFNER ENERGY: AN IMMEDIATE SOLUTION FOR THE DECARBONIZATION OF AVIATION (French version - FR)

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Technical and Economic Note — EJS

1. A Delay to Overcome

The European ReFuelEU Aviation regulation requires a steadily increasing incorporation of sustainable aviation fuels (SAF): 2% in 2025, 6% in 2030, 32% in 2040, and 63% in 2050 — representing an eightfold increase in demand between 2030 and 2050. However, during a roundtable organized by the FNAM, French air transport stakeholders themselves highlighted France’s lag compared to other countries, particularly the United States.

A first step has been taken: on June 9, 2026, Technip Energies, Airbus, Safran, and Tereos announced the “Rebound” project, an Alcohol-to-Jet (AtJ) SAF project in Dunkirk targeting 160,000 tons per year. This is a welcome development, but this pathway relies on sugar beet — an agricultural feedstock that directly competes with food uses, one of the well-known drawbacks of first-generation biofuels.

2. The SAFNOCA Process: An Alternative and Feedstock-Agnostic Pathway

Haffner Energy has developed SAFNOCA, a SAF production solution based on the thermolysis of residual biomass followed by Fischer-Tropsch synthesis. The process converts biomass into syngas (H₂ + CO), then turns this syngas into liquid fuel: approximately 1 kg of hydrogen produced yields 3.2 kg of SAF.

The major difference from the AtJ pathway: SAFNOCA operates on non-food feedstocks — cereal straw, forestry residues, Class B wood, green waste, and sorted refuse-derived fuel (RDF) — tested on 140 types of biomass. No pressure on arable food-producing land or forests. The mobilizable national potential amounts to tens of millions of tons per year, currently considered a disposal burden.

3. An Already Competitive Economy, Without Electricity Dependence

The currently available reference module (C-iC / H6, 2 to 5 MW, 60 kg H₂/h) targets a production cost below 2 €/kg of hydrogen or equivalent fuel — a figure that depends on the biomass used and has improved over time (from 2.34 €/kg initially to under 2 €/kg recently).

Applying the conversion ratio (1 kg H₂ → 3.2 kg SAF) and the Fischer-Tropsch synthesis cost (~0.45 €/kg, independent of hydrogen price), the gross cost of Haffner SAF is around 1.08 to 1.18 €/kg — already on par with fossil kerosene (1.18–1.38 €/kg) using only the module available today.

This calculation does not yet account for the major co-product of the process: biochar. For each kg of SAF produced, approximately 0.9 kg of biochar is generated, which can be monetized on the carbon credit market (CORC index: 110–140 €/t of CO₂ sequestered, i.e., 275–420 €/t of biochar depending on the sequestration rate). When including this credit, the net cost of Haffner SAF drops to approximately 0.69–0.92 €/kg — 30 to 50% below the price of fossil kerosene.

Another structural advantage: the process is autothermal and requires no significant electricity from the grid. This is the opposite of e-SAF produced via electrolysis (2.50–4.00 €/kg), whose cost depends directly on the price of green electricity — a dependency that SAFNOCA completely eliminates.

A second module (H4/S-iC), currently under development, aims to significantly increase production capacity and further optimize these margins. Detailed figures for this module have not yet been disclosed to the market, but the observed trajectory on the H6 (continuous reduction in hydrogen cost) suggests that overall production costs will converge toward very low levels, potentially close to zero in the long term.

4. For a Company Seeking to Decarbonize Its Aviation Operations

Beyond price alone, SAFNOCA offers a combination of cumulative advantages for a buyer (airline, airport, or industrial player looking to secure SAF supply):

5. Conclusion

The technology exists, the module is available, and the public figures demonstrate competitiveness against fossil fuels already achieved with the H6 module. France thus has an SAF pathway that is agnostic to agricultural land, capable of meeting ReFuelEU obligations without repeating the food-vs-fuel trade-offs of the AtJ pathway. The challenge now is to turn this technical availability into actual deployment.