Summary:
For years, Europe’s sustainable aviation fuel ambitions have been measured in targets, timelines, and policy documents. Now, for the first time, there’s real data. The European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) published its inaugural ReFuelEU Aviation Annual Technical Report in October 2025, drawing on compliance filings from fuel suppliers, aircraft operators, and airports across the bloc for the 2024 calendar year.
The headline figure is both a milestone and a warning: in 2024, just 0.6% of all aviation fuel supplied at EU airports was SAF — 193 kilotonnes in total. That’s the baseline. And it’s a long way from the 2% mandatory blend that became law for 2025, applying to roughly 150 Union airports that handle more than 800,000 passengers per year.
The report doesn’t just establish a benchmark — it reveals structural fault lines in the European SAF market. Supply is strikingly concentrated, feedstocks are overwhelmingly imported, synthetic fuels are nowhere near commercial readiness, and the price gap between SAF and conventional jet fuel remains vast. Yet beneath the caution, there’s also a genuine signal: production capacity is on track for 2030’s 6% mandate — if the industry moves fast enough.
Key Takeaways
- 0.6% vs 2%: The EU supplied just 0.6% SAF in 2024 against a 2% mandatory target that took effect in 2025 — a significant compliance gap heading into the first enforcement year.
- Heavily concentrated supply: 25 fuel suppliers delivered SAF to 33 airports across 12 Member States, but five countries (France, Germany, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden) accounted for 99% of all supply.
- Import-dependent feedstocks: 69% of SAF feedstocks originated outside the EU — with China supplying 38% and Malaysia 12%. Used cooking oil (81%) and waste animal fats (17%) dominated the mix.
- Synthetic eSAF essentially absent: No EU synthetic aviation fuel facility has reached Final Investment Decision, leaving the 1.2% eSAF sub-mandate for 2030 (~600kt) at serious risk.
- Price premium remains steep: SAF averaged €2,085/tonne in 2024 versus €734/tonne for conventional jet fuel — nearly a 3× premium that continues to suppress voluntary uptake.
- 2030 outlook cautiously positive: Under the Realistic production scenario, EU SAF output could reach 3.6Mt by 2030 — clearing the ~2.8Mt required for the 6% mandate.
The numbers are unambiguous. Europe flew on less than one percent sustainable fuel in 2024. Every tonne of SAF that did get dispensed came almost entirely from the same feedstock — used cooking oil — processed through a narrow band of refineries and piped to a handful of the bloc’s busiest airports. By any honest measure, the ReFuelEU Aviation Regulation is inheriting a market that barely exists in the form the regulation assumes.
And yet, the EASA report is not a verdict of failure. It’s a baseline — the first time rigorous compliance-grade data has been gathered across the EU SAF supply chain. That in itself is progress. Before ReFuelEU, Europe had no binding monitoring system, no standardised reporting, and no enforceable blending targets. Now it has all three.
“This first Annual Technical Report marks an important milestone and makes clear that the EU has taken important first steps. A functioning reporting system is now in place, initial reporting compliance levels are solid, and SAF delivery is happening across multiple Member States.” — Maria Rueda, EASA Safety Management Director
The Supply Concentration Problem
Perhaps the most striking finding is how geographically narrow the EU SAF market remains. Five Member States — France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, and Sweden — accounted for 99% of all SAF supplied in 2024. The remaining 22 EU members contributed almost nothing. This isn’t simply a question of airport size or passenger volume; it reflects the uneven distribution of refining infrastructure, biofuel feedstock access, and policy incentives across the bloc.
For ReFuelEU to work as designed, that concentration must break down. The regulation applies to ~150 airports across the EU, not just the five hubs that currently dominate supply. Bringing regional airports into compliance will require infrastructure investment, commercial agreements, and supply chain development that most of the bloc hasn’t yet initiated.
The Feedstock Dependency Risk
The feedstock picture raises a separate strategic concern. Nearly 70% of SAF feedstock in 2024 came from outside the EU, with China (38%) and Malaysia (12%) as the dominant suppliers of the used cooking oil and animal fats that underpin almost all current European SAF production.
This import dependency creates vulnerabilities that policymakers are only beginning to grapple with — trade disruptions, feedstock price volatility, and the sustainability certification challenges that come with long supply chains. The EU’s stated ambition is to develop domestic feedstock pathways, but HEFA from imported waste oils remains the only commercially viable route at scale today.
The eSAF Gap
The most structurally important finding concerns synthetic aviation fuels. ReFuelEU sets a specific sub-mandate for eSAF — fuels produced from green hydrogen and captured CO₂ — that rises to 1.2% of jet fuel by 2030 and 35% by 2050. In 2024, not a single kilogram of synthetic SAF was supplied at any EU airport. Worse, no EU eSAF facility has yet reached Final Investment Decision.
EASA’s production scenarios put the 2030 eSAF requirement at approximately 600,000 tonnes. Under the Realistic scenario, which excludes pre-FID projects, synthetic fuel production by 2030 is essentially zero. The Optimistic scenario — which includes announced but unbuilt facilities — shows 700,000 tonnes, which would just meet the sub-mandate. The gap between Realistic and Optimistic is where billions of euros in investment decisions will be made over the next 24 to 36 months.
The Price Wall
Throughout the report, cost acts as an underlying constraint on everything. At €2,085/tonne versus €734/tonne for conventional jet fuel, SAF carries a nearly threefold cost premium even before downstream blending and distribution costs are factored in. Synthetic fuels are dramatically more expensive still — EASA estimates eSAF production costs ranging from €7,500 to €8,225/tonne, depending on the CO₂ source.
No airline or fuel supplier will voluntarily absorb those costs at scale without policy compulsion or financial support mechanisms. The European Commission’s forthcoming Sustainable Transport Investment Plan (STIP) is intended to address part of this gap — but the scale of incentive required to bridge a 3–10× cost premium across an entire continental fuel supply chain is orders of magnitude larger than what any current programme contemplates.
What the 2025 Data Will Tell Us
The 2024 report is a baseline. The 2025 report — due in 2026 — will be the first true compliance test: did EU fuel suppliers meet the 2% mandatory blending target? Given that reporting compliance for 2024 was only 67% among fuel suppliers, EASA has explicitly called for full participation in 2025 to enable meaningful assessment.
The answer, when it comes, will be the clearest signal yet of whether ReFuelEU is working as a market-shaping mechanism — or whether Europe’s most ambitious aviation decarbonisation regulation is running ahead of the industry’s ability to deliver.
Source: EASA