Without further delay, we give the floor to Don Javier
Díaz-Díez, from Repsol, a leading company in energy.
Don Javier is the head of sustainable aviation
and technical assistance in the company,
and he is an aeronautical engineer for
the Polytechnic University of Madrid.
And, well, he's going to talk to us about the
use of renewable fuels in the air sector, right?
Whenever you want. Thank you.
Hello, thank you very much for the invitation.
While the presentation is being put on,
no, this is not.
Okay.
Well, I'm going to tell you a little bit about what
the use of renewable fuels in the air sector is,
although I think that many of what I am going to tell
you have already been commented on by previous speakers,
but a little from our point of view as fuel
producers and as producers of this, of the SAF,
which I am going to talk about so much today.
To begin with, I will start by talking a little about
what the state of emissions is in air transport,
and what is the objective that we have set for ourselves, and why.
And a little explaining how the SAF is produced,
or at least today, the ways we have to do it.
We are doing it in Repsol.
Then another very important part, why the SAF is compatible,
and why it is one of the main advantages it has, so as not
to have to change anything in the current infrastructure.
And to finish, I will talk a little about the
certifications, which is very important in the end,
to guarantee the traceability of the entire product from
the raw material until it reaches the wing of the plane.
As has already been commented before, in 2019 aviation
emitted about 900 million tons of CO2 into the environment.
Globally, human action is responsible for about 43 billion tons of CO2,
which means that aviation is responsible for 2% of the total emissions.
And if we restrict ourselves to the world of
transport, of the emissions from
transport, in this case aviation would be
responsible for 12% of the CO2 emissions.
And in order to eliminate all these emissions and
reduce them, the SAF is the main lever we have to
decarbonize both in the short and medium term.
As has already been said before, the aviation industry
has proposed that in 2050 we are net zero emissions,
and the main lever we are going to have to
reach that goal is the fuel to sustain aviation,
which here in this graph you can see that it
can be up to 60% of the reduction of emissions.
Then there will also be a series of technological developments,
new aircraft, new materials that can reach up to 20%.
Then improvements in operations and infrastructure,
such as improvements in the way of approaching airports,
continuous approaches to reduce fuel consumption in these maneuvers,
and a little will have to continue being measures
based on the market, which is what carbon credits are.
The refueling regulation of the European Union, as well as the mandate,
has come into force at the beginning of this year,
where 2% of all the fuel that is put into
aircraft is fuel to sustain aviation,
so that any of those present here has already
saved a little bit of SAF in the aircraft.
A very important goal that we have set
ourselves, which is already four years away,
is the sub-mandate of what we call ISAF, synthetic fuel,
and by 2050 we want to reach 70% of the SAF mix in aviation fuel,
which is a very ambitious challenge for which we have to start working,
and we have been working for many years now.
A little to explain to you how advanced biofuels work,
biomass in itself, when it decomposes
or is naturally stored in the landfill,
or even is valorized, it emits CO2 again
and a part of methane to the environment.
So what advanced biofuels do is that the CO2 that
that biomass has obtained during its photosynthesis
is the same CO2 that the aircraft will emit in its
use, because its raw material comes from biomass.
That is why we say that they are fuels
with zero net emissions in vehicle or use.
In the case of synthetic fuels it is similar,
what happens is that the CO2 that is used for
its production comes from industrial processes
destined either for concentrated sources
or it is obtained directly from the air.
So by combining that CO2 with hydrogen from renewable sources,
we get this synthetic fuel and it becomes zero emissions in use.
A little to explain what the carbon footprint concept is,
the carbon footprint takes into account all emissions
from fuel production to its use in the vehicle.
That is, the net balance of CO2 emissions in use is added to
the emissions that are emitted in the production of said fuel.
So the reduction is obtained by subtracting
what would be emitted with a traditional route,
the traditional fossil jet versus these new fuels.
Therefore, the reduction of emissions in the productive process
of the fuel itself is very important to reduce this footprint.
Because of this, it will always be possible
to achieve reductions of even 100%,
but right now we are reaching reductions
of the footprint of around 80-90%.
A little more in detail about what we are doing in RedSol,
right now we have three ways to produce this fuel.
The coprocessed, which is a route that has been used for many years,
which basically adds raw raw material, mixes and refines.
This coprocessing is limited to 5% so that the properties
of the jet do not vary and are combative with the renewable.
Then, in the plant in Cartagena, we have the capacity to produce between
200 and 250,000 tons of renewable fuels per year with the EFA route.
And in the pilot plant that we are building
in Bilbao, we want to produce IFUELS.
The main raw material is CO2 itself, combined
with hydrogen from renewable sources.
We will produce this ISAF that has to
come into force in 2030 in the mandate.
And the main raw material that is used is basically
used cooking oil or waste from the food industry
that are not edible or conflict with human food.
Here you can see a small scheme of our fuel plant in Cartagena,
which, as I have commented, is from organic waste
mixed with hydrogen from our hydrogen plant,
which goes through a hydrothermal treatment unit and we manufacture
a whole range of renewable fuels from these hydrogen waste,
from biojet, biopropane, hydrobiodiesel or bionaft.
This plant will allow us to reduce emissions
of up to 900,000 tons of CO2 per year.
And as has already been mentioned before, it is a very innovative
circular economy project to give a second life to these waste
and above all it is generating jobs and revitalizing the industry.
On the other hand, in the project we
have in Bilbao, the demo plant in Bilbao,
from renewable electricity we manage to carry out the
electrolysis of water in which we separate oxygen from hydrogen.
This hydrogen can be considered 100% renewable
hydrogen and in turn it is combined with the CO2
that will be obtained either from our own industry
there in Petronor or directly from the air.
By combining them we get a synthetic fuel with zero net emissions.
One of the main points and the most important thing about this fuel,
the SAF, is that it is totally compatible with current aircraft.
Why? Because it basically passes all the same
certification criteria as the fossil jet,
because to be a little bit in the background,
the traditional aviation fuel is certified.
The simplest way to explain it is that in the end an aircraft
cannot be taken by surprise without any airport in the world
and the jet has to be exactly the same in any
airport in the world to be able to use it.
Then, as for the sustainable aviation fuel, there is a
rule that is set by the American Standard Society, the STM,
which is the D7566, which collects the synthetic
aviation fuel quality of the 8 routes that are approved,
which can reach up to a 50% market percentage.
These same production routes, in turn, have to be approved
by another rule, also by the same American Standard Society,
which is the 4054, which defines both the raw
materials allowed, the conversion process,
the characteristics of the mixing component and the mixing criteria.
And once mixed with the traditional fuel, the final mixture must
meet exactly the same quality requirements as the traditional jet A1,
so the final fuel is totally compatible with
the aircraft that use this type of fuel.
In fact, one of the best examples is that in Spain the Exulum
network is the one that provides the fuel to the aircraft
and the fossil jet mixes with the SAF
without any problem and reaches the aircraft.
It is one of the virtues that we have in the Spanish system.
As for the 100% SAF, it is currently not allowed to use it.
The STM is working to certify it and
some test flights have been carried out,
but we still have to wait to reach those percentages in the mix.
And to finish, I am going to tell you a little bit about how
this whole process is certified, which is a very important part,
because in the end it is important to ensure that
all the raw material from the origin is traced
so that it does not conflict with the food or,
based on producing sustainable aviation fuel,
we are harming sensitive areas of the planet or similar problems.
So, on the one hand, there is the certification
that is the main body that is dedicated to this,
it is approved by the European Commission, it is
mandatory if the SAF wants to be accounted for
for the national goals of renewable energy,
then what it requires is complete traceability
from the origin of the raw material to the final product.
And it can be done by balance of masses or by physical gradation.
And the key here is that the attribute of sustainability
is always linked to the physical delivery of the product.
That is, if, for example, we at Repsol
sell SAF to an airline in Madrid, we deliver the product to it in
Madrid, that is, we deliver fuel to it,
and the attribute of sustainability is delivered to it in Madrid.
And it is the main difference with what I am going to tell
you now, which is another scheme, which is the book and claim.
To explain it with an example, we are producing the
FAE fuel in Cartagena and then we send it to Madrid.
However, with an airline that transports a
load of IKEA from a Chinese city to Mexico.
So both the airline and IKEA will be able
to claim the attribute of sustainability
at the departure and arrival airports of the
airline's plane, which is a Chinese airport
and an airport that is in Mexico, which has nothing to do with Spain.
Then Repsol will issue a certificate of reduction
to said airline of reach 1 and reach 3 to IKEA.
But in Madrid-Barajas we will have delivered the product, but we
will not deliver the attributes of sustainability to any airline
because the important thing here is to avoid
double computers or double accounting in emissions.
And it has gone very fast, but I think it's good for the time.
So, for my part, the main conclusion is that
the SAF is the main alternative to decarbonize.
It is a certified accredited solution, it is a safe
solution since it goes through the same quality controls
as a drop-in solution, it is not necessary to adapt any
infrastructure, no logistics chain, no planes, no turbines.
Without more.
Well, thank you very much Javier for
being concise, for adapting to the time.
We are, as I say, subjugated by it, right?
And indeed, it comes, thanks, it comes to justify
the presence of such a global actor as Repsol,
the leader in the energy field, with all the solutions
it is having, and especially in the SAF, which has
made a wonderful performance in that.
Possibly, the round table, we will delve into it.