(Photo: Getty Creatives)
As demand for sustainable aviation fuel, or “SAF,” continues to grow, with airlines facing prohibitive costs and a lack of availability to meet their carbon neutrality commitments, a Swiss startup is putting its faith in in a technology he believes will change everything. that.
Meet the good people at Metafuels, who are working furiously at Switzerland’s largest research center for natural and engineering sciences – the Paul Scherrer Institute in Würenlingen – on a pilot project and demonstration plant designed to use e-methanol for made e-SAF.
The “e” prefix is placed on a SAF production process that uses renewable energy. The potential market size of e-SAFs could be in the range of 80-120 billion gallons by 2050, according to projections provided by the International Energy Agency and the International Air Transport Association.
At a time when e-SAF projects are all the rage, what makes Metafuels stand out is the manufacturing process the startup has embraced, according to its co-founders – Saurabh Kapoor, CEO and Leigh Hackett, chairman.
Reaching the e-SAF molecule more efficiently
Usually plants producing or intending to produce e-SAF happen to deploy the Fischer-Tropsch process. It is a sequence of chemical reactions that converts a mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen, or synthetic gas, into liquid hydrocarbons.
But in a break from convention in 2021, when they incorporated Metafuels and put their ideas into action, Kapoor, Hackett and Ulrich Koss, also a co-founder and chief technologist, chose an alternative synthetic fuel route known as methanol synthesis.
It involves either producing methanol from carbon monoxide and hydrogen at high pressure using zinc and copper oxide as catalysts, or using an existing stable source of methanol, and then synthesizing a longer-chain hydrocarbon as the fuel of the jet from methanol.
The process involves additional steps and the use of a catalyst to produce the desired chemical reactions for Metachars. “It’s all about how you convert methanol to SAF selectively and efficiently, which is where we believe we have an edge over our competitors,” Kapoor said.
The Metafuels Team (Left to Right) Marco Ranocchiari, Head of ESI, PSI, Pedro Alvarez, Head of R&D, … [+]
“The laboratory pilot (at PSI, Switzerland) has been successful and the demo plant is ready to go at the same location,” Kapoor confirmed, adding that the published results are likely to receive more than just approval from the wider industry. .
“I can say with confidence that if you put a Fischer-Tropsch project and our project in the same place, all other things being equal, the estimated cost of production of our e-SAF would likely be around 50% lower and about 80% higher yield. This is huge in terms of cost savings and efficiency gains.”
The startup counts a dozen specialists from ten different nationalities in its team and high-level collaboration from PSI led by Marco Ranocchiari, head of the facility’s Energy Systems Integration platform, which tests its facility for friendly energy sources with the environment of the future.
AspenTech’s digital twin technology deployment, rigorous monitoring, data collection and analytics are among the large set of tools Metafuels is using to fine-tune its plant technology and its e-SAF product output, which has been dubbed like Aerobrew.
Metafuels’ lab pilot is currently producing one liter per day, with the demo plant capable of producing 50 liters per day.
Hackett added: “Aerobrew can replace conventional jet fuel regardless of aircraft size, type and short or long haul. The ultimate ambition is to produce single e-SAF production trains of up to 2,000 tonnes per day, made our offering a lot of scalability.
“Metafuels is the only methanol-to-SAF startup known to us globally. Other companies said to be working to make methanol-to-SAF pathways commercially viable are large established corporations.”
Commercialization of Brew
With a proven product and process underpinning its Aerobrew, things are getting “commercially serious” for Metafuels, Kapoor said. The company is selectively seeking and receiving institutional money for its future plans.
“We closed 2024 with a $9 million capital raising round in December. It follows an $8 million raise in 2023, as well as a $5 million grant from the Swiss Federal Energy Office, bringing Metafuels’ total secured funding to $22 million.”
The latest round was led by Celsius Industries, RockCreek, Fortescue Energy Ventures and Verve Ventures. Existing investors – Energy Impact Partners and Contrarian Ventures – also expanded their investment in Metafuels.
Example of sustainable e-aviation fuel, Aerobrew, Swiss cleantech startup Metafuels.
“This has enabled our demo site of 50 liters per day at PSI. Metafuels has also signed an agreement to set up e-SAF facilities in Denmark and the Netherlands with production capacities of 10 tonnes (12,000 liters) per day, starting with the Danish plant. which could be in circulation in 2028,” Hackett said.
As the development phase of the project begins, early conversations have begun with Metafuels, including an alliance of potential buyers with airlines, fuel suppliers, airports and corporate travelers.
Local to Global
In addition to being involved in e-SAF projects, Metafuels will also commercialize its technology through a licensing business, Kapoor noted.
“We intend to have two main commercial routes – one, to have our technology available to any interested party who wants to use it by building e-SAF plants but is not interested in reverse engineering, and two, to be active there in seed projects that have a good chance of success”.
Metafuels does not want to be limited by geography as a provider of e-SAF solutions. But the startup’s initial focus for its project development business is likely to be local and then pan-European.
“This is because renewable electricity is not equally available in all geographies. This raises issues of decarbonisation and competitiveness that make a truly sustainable fuel from the effective use of valuable nutrients – CO2 and energy renewable,” Kapoor said.
“Furthermore, it should be considered whether the entire value chain, including methanol synthesis, can be implemented at an e-SAF production site or the methanol would be shipped.”
“Ultimately, we want to be the lowest cost e-SAF or in other words to be the true enabler of the affordable decarbonisation of aviation. From this assertion, and given the airline industry’s need to reduce emissions, the future will see our projects or technology multiply geographies.”
