In this issue: ITA's Brazil partnership; Project SkyPower calls for action to unlock European e-SAF market; MPP & ITA to drive debate at COP29
Mission Possible Partnership
Alliance of climate leaders focused on accelerating decarbonisation across high-emitting industries in the years ahead.
Signal from MPP | Issue No. 17 | November 2024
In this latest issue of Signal, we highlight work happening across MPP, from South America to Europe, and importantly in partnership with others, to help accelerate the global drive towards industrial decarbonisation:
Supporting Brazil to become a thriving, low-carbon industrial power
The Industrial Transition Accelerator’s (ITA) ambitious new regional partnership in Brazil is rapidly moving forward with the announcement, this month, of support for its first commercial scale decarbonisation project.
The Uberaba Green Fertilizer project by Atlas Agro is set to become the first green nitrogen fertiliser project in Brazil and marks a key step in supporting Brazil’s green industrial projects. Currently, Brazil imports 85% of its agricultural fertiliser making it the world’s largest importer and vulnerable to potential supply chain disruption. Atlas Agro’s plants will instead be built close to farmers. This mature project is currently in its engineering studies phase and is now actively moving towards Final Investment Decision (FID), hoped for by the end of 2025. More than 15 additional projects have been identified by the ITA in Brazil from across the fertiliser, Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAF), steel and aluminium sectors representing an investment opportunity worth over $33bn.
The ITA’s partnership with the Brazilian government began in July but was officially launched in October by the ITA and the Brazilian Ministry of Development, Industry, Trade and Services teams in S?o Paulo. The agreement underpins efforts to support government and businesses in terms of policy alignment, financing facilitation, and market engagement to reduce risks for green project developers.
"It’s all about creating conditions for success,” explained Marc Moutinho ITA’s Brazil programme manager. “It's about creating policy conditions, market conditions, and financing that make projects more economically viable."?
Identifying the pipeline
Based on ITA’s initial research, Brazil holds enormous potential for green industrial growth offering the chance to expand its industrial capacity while avoiding over 33 million tons of CO2 emissions annually. The partnership follows a two-year timeline and is now in the ‘solutions design phase’, running to the end of 2024 this phase is identifying a growing pipeline of projects with the potential to reach FID in the next two years, based on four key criteria:
“We are engaging with many projects, selecting the ones most aligned with our parameters, and understanding what challenges they face,” explained Moutinho.
Bridging the green premium
A significant obstacle for green projects is the "green premium"— the current added cost of producing low-carbon products. The ITA is seeking to address this challenge by advocating for favourable policy conditions, including subsidies or incentives, to make green projects economically viable. Another strategy involves helping projects identify early buyers willing to absorb the higher costs of green commodities, and developing government policies, like mandates, that can scale up that initial demand.
Throughout the programme, the ITA aims to identify and discuss mechanisms to reduce risks, boost financing, and stimulate a sustainable supply chain. The aim is to create an environment where green projects can thrive.
“We’re not project developers; companies know their business better than we ever could,” said Moutinho. “But we can make sure that the conditions around them improve, so they have a better chance of success.”
Business leader Paul Polman, CEO of KLM Marjan Rintel, and 12 other aviation sector CEO’s call for urgent action to unlock European e-SAF market worth €80bn by 2050
The aviation industry faces a critical window of less than two years to get first-of-a-kind e-SAF plants to Final Investment Decision (FID) or risk missing regulated mandates, according to a new report from Project SkyPower.
The initiative is led by a group of 13 CEOs and over 40 member organisations from across the aviation value chain working to unlock the potential of e-SAF and make it a commercial reality this decade. It aims to break down the barriers facing e-SAF in Europe, accelerate progress towards scaling this innovative fuel and pave the way for first-of-a-kind e-SAF plants to reach final investment decision by the end of 2025.
e-SAF or electro-fueled sustainable aviation fuel is chemically identical to fossil jet fuel but is produced using renewable electricity, water and carbon dioxide captured directly from the air or via point-source capture. As such, it creates at least 90% less greenhouse gas emissions over its lifecycle compared to fossil jet fuel.
“Today, our industry faces its biggest challenge yet: reducing its climate impact. e-SAF will play an important role in addressing this challenge,” said Marjan Rintel, chief executive of KLM and co-chair of Project SkyPower on behalf of Air France-KLM. “Project SkyPower is modelling the conditions required to overcome the barriers to scaling e-SAF. By working together, we now have a shared economic model for e-SAF, and an action plan to be implemented by the wider aviation ecosystem.”
10-point plan to unlock investment
The new report shows that Europe is in a strong position to be a technology leader on e-SAF, potentially unlocking a EUR 80+ billion market opportunity for Europe by 2050 and securing the future of the 14 million existing jobs in European aviation.
However, while two-thirds of the global e-SAF pipeline is in Europe, no plants have currently achieved final investment decision.
The new report sets out a tangible 10-point action plan to accelerate investment in the e-SAF ecosystem, with four critical objectives to:??
Action needed now to scale delivery
Project SkyPower’s modelling indicates that, without government subsidies, the production cost alone of e-SAF in Europe could be five to eight times the price of fossil jet fuel, including ETS (Emissions Trading Scheme) costs.?
But this cost could fall by up to half over the coming decade through additional innovation and economies of scale if investment in the first e-SAF plants is made now.
Before the end of the year, Project SkyPower's CEO cohort will meet to discuss how this new analysis can be practically translated into actionable steps to drive progress towards is goal.
“Successful delivery of Project SkyPower ‘s action plan will fundamentally change the e-SAF landscape, establishing the necessary conditions to take Final Investment Decisions and accelerate this critical technology towards commercial operation by 2030,” said Amy Hebert, CEO of Arcadia eFuels and co-chair of Project SkyPower.
The Secretariat of Project SkyPower is led by Systemiq Ltd., Green Finance Institute, and the Mission Possible Partnership. Read the full report here.
The ITA and MPP are set to drive COP29 debates on industrial decarbonisation with multiple events showcasing fresh Global Project Tracker data and insights, learnings from country partnerships and on-the-ground work, and policy recommendations
As part of the COP29 summit taking place in Baku, Azerbaijan, later this month, the ITA will host a high-level dialogue on ‘Shifting Gears: accelerating delivery through collaborative action in power, industry, transport and buildings’ in partnership with the Breakthrough Agenda on Thursday 14th November in the Climate Action Zone. The event is open to all Blue Zone badge holders and split into three sessions:
The event aims to show the power and potential of international collaboration, highlighting the progress made in the past year. It will shine a spotlight on the tangible actions that are needed to mobilise investment, build skills and capabilities, address barriers to trade and is an opportunity for a deep dive into the critical role of demand stimulating policies across multiple sectors.
The most recent Global Project Tracker data will be released on this day for discussion at the event along with the ITA’s?Demand Stimulation Playbook, which will set out a range of evidence-based policy measures available to governments to increase demand for low- and near-zero-carbon materials, chemicals and fuels – such as green ammonia, green steel and cement, and sustainable aviation fuels – so as to unlock supply.
A roundtable providing learnings and insights from the ITA’s work to support project developers across Brazil and the UAE will be held on Saturday 16th November in the Magham room, Blue Zone. The session will include contributions from the Brazilian Ministry of Development, Industry, Trade and Services (MDIC) and the UAE Ministry of Industry and Advanced Technology (MoIAT) about the economic opportunity presented by green industrial development. The ITA Secretariat will outline its approach to the Project Support Programmes working with a portfolio of deep decarbonisation projects to accelerate collective efforts and drive speed and scale of delivery. There will also be the opportunity to hear from project developers who are working with the ITA.
Upcoming events & partnerships
Hear more from MPP at events and access tickets on related conferences from our partners.
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Mission Possible Partnership is?a movement of climate leaders in business and civil society driving industrial decarbonisation across the entire value chain of the world’s highest-emitting sectors: aluminium, cement, chemicals, steel; aviation, shipping, and trucking. We’re charting the inventive steps and radical collaboration to enable commercial-scale deep decarbonisation projects in this decisive decade.