LanzaJet, a sustainable fuels technology company recently partnered with Microsoft Climate Innovation Fund to enable the transition towards net-zero sustainable fuels. The company announced it has secured financing for its Freedom Pines Fuels plant in Georgia, through the Microsoft Climate Innovation Fund. The Microsoft Climate Innovation Fund made a $50M investment to support the construction of LanzaJet’s (and the world’s) first alcohol-to-jet sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) production plant. The innovative structure of Microsoft’s financing will enable the company to bring lower-cost sustainable aviation fuel and renewable diesel to the global market. LanzaJet is dedicated to accelerating the energy transition in sectors where decarbonisation is hard. This includes sectors like aviation.
LanzaJet produces SAF and renewable diesel from low-carbon, sustainable ethanol sources. This investment, therefore, creates the opportunity to work together in enabling Freedom Pines Fuels plants, and catalyse the market for 2nd generation, waste-based ethanol feedstock, demonstrating clear demand signals for ethanol that can achieve greater carbon reductions. The construction of Freedom Pines Fuels is progressing, even with supply chain, manufacturing, and labour shortages impacting the global economy. Fabrication of the plant is well underway; some modules are already completed, and final site engineering is nearing completion. The LanzaJet Freedom Pines Fuels plant is expected to achieve mechanical completion by end of 2022 and begin producing 10 million gallons of SAF and renewable diesel per year from sustainable ethanol, including from waste-based feedstocks, in 2023. The investment was made as part of Microsoft’s efforts to achieve its 2030 goal of becoming carbon negative and advancing a net-zero economy. It allows Microsoft to access sustainable, renewable diesel for its data centers to enable Microsoft to further achieve its net-zero goals.
The Biden administration set a goal for achieving net-zero aviation emissions by 2050, with the E.U. wanting to increase the amount of SAF blended to 63% by 2050. In September of 2021, the White House announced a target of 3 billion gallons of SAF produced per year by 2030. As part of that announcement, LanzaJet shared it would strive to achieve 1B gallons of SAF production in the US by 2030, significantly supporting US ambitions. The collaboration between LanzaJet and the Microsoft Climate Innovation Fund demonstrates that such an innovative investment approach breaks down barriers by deploying new technologies, improves our nation’s infrastructure, and creates new economic opportunities in rural communities. The development of LanzaJet’s Freedom Pines Fuels plant is supported by funding from the U.S. Department of Energy Bioenergy Technologies Office.
Jimmy Samartzis, LanzaJet CEO, said, “We know that creating the change which our world desperately needs requires perseverance, innovation, and like-minded partnerships. We are thrilled to bring on Microsoft and its Climate Innovation Fund to help us build our first-of-its-kind sustainable fuels plant in Georgia. The partnership with Microsoft is more than just financing – it advances our work towards net zero fuels, it enables lower-cost sustainable fuels into the market, and it supports the urgency to have real, proven technologies scale-up and deploy. We set a bold ambition to support the White House with a goal of 1 billion gallons of sustainable fuels by 2030. With Microsoft’s support, this first plant significantly expands the production of sustainable fuels in the US, establishes Georgia as a leader in clean tech, and is the foundation for us as the first alcohol-to-jet sustainable fuels producer, and as a blueprint for the commercial plants we’re developing globally,” he further added.
