Ellesmere Port Facility Awarded £16m by Government to Develop Sustainable Aviation Fuel
The plant is expected to be operational in 2027
Ellesmere Port will be at the centre of the UK’s push to slash carbon emissions from aviation, with the Government awarding Fulcrum BioEnergy £16.5m to develop a sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) production facility.The plant is expected to be operational in 2027 and produce 83.7kt/y of SAF when at full operational capacity.
Fulcrum BioEnergy’s NorthPoint facility at the Stanlow refinery complex will convert black bin bag waste into liquid fuel on a commercial scale, with operations expected to start in 2027. The project is developing a commercial scale plant that uses gasification and Fischer-Tropsch technology to convert black bin bag waste into sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).
It comes as part of the Government’s £165 million Advanced Fuels Fund, which is supporting new plants and projects which will create thousands of green jobs, and will use different methods of creating SAF, whether converting it from everyday household and commercial waste to steel mill off-gases.
One plant will also see the early development of a SAF plant using carbon capture and hydrogen made from renewable electricity.
For US waste-to-energy giant Fulcrum the investment at the Stanlow site will “de-risk” the project and build on the technical knowledge and experience the company has gained from well over a decade of project development and the early operations of its US based, ‘Sierra BioFuels’ plant – the world’s first waste to sustainable hydrocarbon fuels facility.
Building on the success of the Green Fuels, Green Skies programme, the five projects will alone produce over 300,000 tonnes of SAF a year – enough to fly to the moon and back an estimated 60 times.
The successful projects will also slash CO2 emissions by an average of 200,000 tonnes each year once fully up and running – the equivalent of taking 100,000 cars off the road.
Transport Secretary Mark Harper said: “Using waste or by-products to refuel airliners sounds like a flight of fancy, but thanks to £165 million of Government funding it’s going to help us make guilt-free flying a reality.
“It’s exactly this kind of innovation that will help us create thousands of green jobs across the country and slash our carbon emissions.”
The winners of the Advanced Fuel Fund are based across the UK – from the North of England to South Wales, and will create thousands of skilled, green jobs.
Launched alongside the Jet Zero Strategy in July 2022, the Advanced Fuel Fund is designed to accelerate the development of SAF production plants in the UK, helping the Government to achieve its aim of having at least five commercial SAF plants under construction in the UK by 2025.
Jeff Ovens, Managing Director, Fulcrum Bioenergy said: “Alongside the operational experience gained from Sierra, this DfT funding will further help de-risk the NorthPoint Project and target ‘investor ready’ status, in preparation for construction start in 2025 and operations in 2027.”