Conference Agenda

The U.S. biofuels sector is increasingly central to national energy security, both by diversifying the liquid fuel supply and by adding new energy sources. Yet growth remains rapid but uneven, driven by a complex mix of policies, constrained feedstock markets, and emerging conversion technologies. To provide a rigorous basis for tracking biofuel growth and identifying high-impact opportunities for improvement and expansion, this study develops an integrated framework that links facility‑level biofuel production data, life cycle performance, and economy‑wide outcomes with regulatory frameworks and investment choices. Together with inputs from industry stakeholders, we build a comprehensive facility‑level database for biodiesel, renewable diesel, ethanol, sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), and renewable natural gas by synthesizing industry and government data (including federal statistics, low-carbon fuel standard (LCFS) pathway registrations, company reports, and trade press). These data are harmonized with Argonne’s R&D GREET model to quantify life cycle carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e), criteria air pollutants, water consumption, water stress, and land use for current U.S. fuel use, and projections for the next 10 years under existing and announced capacity expansions. We overlay this bottom‑up characterization with a detailed national and state incentive programs, including the Renewable Fuel Standard, the Inflation Reduction Act section 45Z, and LCFS /clean fuels programs in California, Oregon, and Washington, plus SAF‑specific credits in Illinois, Minnesota, and Washington to quantify incentive value by feedstock and pathway and assess their effects on biofuel production growth. Economy‑wide modeling indicates that by 2035, existing and planned biofuels could meet roughly 5-6% of total U.S. fuel demand, driven mainly by policy trajectories, and deliver meaningful reductions in life cycle CO2e emissions, but with growing pressure on water resources and land use, particularly in regions such as Nebraska, Kansas, Colorado, Idaho, California, and North Texas. Results show that first-generation and waste feedstocks dominate current and near-term biofuel production, while there remains a significant untapped opportunity for biofuels to enhance domestic energy supply by scaling cellulosic biomass use, which is crucial for future growth. However, stakeholders emphasized that current capacity expansion for cellulosic biofuels is limited because these alternative feedstocks are not yet cost‑competitive with conventional options, there is no clear commercialization pathway that can compete with existing business models, the United States lacks a developed supply chain for energy grasses (compounding technology challenges with substantial logistics and infrastructure barriers), and financing risk remains the dominant barrier to scaling next‑generation biofuels. At the same time, results show that the current stack of incentives is strong enough to make many biofuels (particularly cellulosic biofuels) cost-competitive with conventional counterparts, although incentive value varies widely by jurisdiction, production technology, feedstock type, and uncertain after program sunsets. Finally, this study will further identify high‑viability regions where scaling cellulosic biofuel production could deliver the most additional, low‑impact gallons and materially strengthen U.S. energy security.

Transitions to low-carbon energy systems require not only technological innovation but also policy designs that align with heterogeneous regional characteristics. In the aviation sector, growing demand combined with the high carbon intensity of jet fuel poses a major challenge for decarbonization. Sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) offers substantial lifecycle emissions reductions, but deployment remains limited due to high production costs, infrastructure constraints, and uncertainty surrounding optimal policy design. While many national and international strategies emphasize SAF scale-up, they often rely on uniform incentives that obscure how regional cost drivers shape economic feasibility across technologies and supply chains.

This study applies and extends the ASCENT techno-economic analysis (TEA) framework to evaluate how regional variation in feedstock availability, energy prices, and capital costs influences the minimum selling price (MSP) of SAF across three production pathways: hydroprocessed esters and fatty acids (HEFA), alcohol-to-jet (ATJ), and Fischer–Tropsch (FT) synthesis. ASCENT is an open-source, Excel-based model developed to support comparative assessment of SAF pathways under harmonized assumptions, including economies of scale and differentiation between first-of-a-kind (FOAK) and nth-of-a-kind plant maturity. While widely used for pathway comparison, ASCENT’s default inputs are largely generic, limiting its usefulness for policy-relevant analysis of spatially heterogeneous systems.

To address this gap, we integrate region-specific data into ASCENT for fifteen major aviation hubs across North America, Europe, and Asia, incorporating feedstock price ranges for forest and agricultural residues, ethanol, isobutanol, and fats, oils, and greases, alongside localized electricity, natural gas, hydrogen, labor, and capital cost factors. Low, baseline, and high input scenarios are modeled, and sensitivity analysis is conducted using tornado charts to identify dominant cost drivers by pathway and location. This approach reframes TEA from a static cost-estimation exercise into a systems-oriented decision-support tool that captures uncertainty, plant maturity dynamics, and regional resource constraints relevant to real-world policy design.

Results show substantial regional divergence in SAF economics. Feedstock costs consistently dominate MSPs for HEFA and ATJ pathways, while FT costs are primarily driven by capital expenditure and electricity prices, particularly in FOAK scenarios. North American hubs exhibit the lowest MSPs due to relatively inexpensive feedstocks and energy, whereas European and Asian hubs face higher and more volatile costs. These findings demonstrate that no single SAF pathway is universally optimal; rather, pathway viability is contingent on local system characteristics, market structures, and upstream policy environments that shape input prices.

The analysis underscores the limitations of one-size-fits-all SAF incentives and highlights the importance of regionally differentiated policy approaches. By linking TEA outputs to system-level policy questions such as where to locate production, which pathways to prioritize, and which cost levers are most impactful; this work illustrates how sustainability analysis at the intersection of technology, policy, and system behavior can support more effective and resilient low-carbon energy transitions in aviation.

In 2023, the transportation and oil and gas sectors accounted for 53% of Canada’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Freight road transport and aviation are difficult to decarbonize, and renewable diesel and sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) are anticipated to play key roles in reducing these emissions. The production and consumption of these biofuels have increased due to climate change concerns, regulatory mandates, and government incentives. In 2024, renewable diesel consumption in Canada was 1.5 billion liters, while domestic production was only 687 million liters. Canada produced only 100 thousand liters of SAF that same year, though, by 2030, demand is projected to reach 1 billion liters. Despite growing demand for these biofuels in Canada, the impact of regulations and incentives on the financial viability of renewable diesel and SAF production has yet to be determined.

Although the role of regulations and incentives for renewable diesel and SAF production has been evaluated in the United States and the European Union, this area remains underexplored in Canada. The study objective is to quantify the impact current federal regulations and provincial incentives have on the financial viability of renewable diesel and SAF production in Canada, comparing various feedstock and production pathway options through environmental and techno-economic analyses.

Different pathways are compared through the development of renewable diesel and SAF biorefinery designs in Aspen Plus. The hydroprocessed esters and fatty acids (HEFA) and Fischer-Tropsch pathways are selected for assessment due to their technological maturity and ability to produce both renewable diesel and SAF. Canola oil and forest residue are selected as the corresponding feedstocks based on availability in Canada. The production process, feedstock selection, and plant location collectively impact the credits generated and available incentives, ultimately affecting the financial feasibility of the project.

The environmental and energy impacts of renewable diesel and SAF production pathways are evaluated for multiple provinces within Canada based on life cycle assessment, which includes feedstock cultivation and collection, transportation, fuel production, distribution, and end use. Preliminary results show that these pathways have the potential to reduce emissions by 65-78% relative to their fossil fuel counterparts, generating approximately 1,900-2,300 credits per million liters of fuel produced. At commercial production scales, this corresponds to a meaningful volume of compliance credits.

A techno-economic analysis is conducted on both technology pathways based on the biorefinery designs in Aspen Plus. The assessment incorporates the project capital expenditure, operating expenditure, volume of production, and available credits and incentives to determine the plant revenue. Using preliminary data for biorefineries producing 100 million liters per year, a minimum required revenue is estimated as 97 million CAD per year for the HEFA pathway and 149 million CAD per year for the Fischer-Tropsch pathway.

This study presents a comparative analysis of biofuel production pathways in Canada and explores, as a final stage of the work, how current regulations and incentives may affect the financial viability of a biorefinery. The findings have the potential to inform policy and regulatory decisions on renewable fuel production in Canada.

Decarbonizing the aviation sector presents a critical sustainability challenge due to the sector’s rapid growth, long-lived infrastructure, and stringent performance requirements that limit the applicability of direct electrification. Sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) derived from lignocellulosic biomass feedstock has emerged as a leading near- to mid-term option for reducing life-cycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions while leveraging existing aircraft and fueling systems. However, the sustainability performance of lignocellulosic SAF pathways remains highly variable, reflecting differences in feedstock sourcing, conversion technology, scale, and system integration. This variability complicates decision-making for policymakers, investors, and technology developers seeking pathways that are both economically viable and environmentally robust.

This work presents a systematic review of an integrated techno-economic and life-cycle assessment (TEA–LCA) synthesis to evaluate the sustainability performance of lignocellulosic SAF systems from a systems perspective. Peer-reviewed studies published between 2018 and 2025 were identified using a PRISMA-guided literature review and screened for quantitative TEA and LCA results. The analysis encompasses thermochemical, biochemical, and hybrid conversion pathways, including gasification–Fischer–Tropsch, fast pyrolysis with upgrading, hydrothermal liquefaction, alcohol-to-jet, and power-and-biomass-to-liquid configurations. Reported minimum selling prices (MSP) were harmonized to common economic assumptions and functional units, while life-cycle GHG emissions were normalized to a consistent fossil jet fuel baseline to enable cross-study comparison.

Results indicate that economies of scale play a secondary role in determining SAF costs, with only a weak inverse relationship observed between plant capacity and MSP. Instead, fuel yield, feedstock cost, hydrogen demand, and system integration emerge as dominant drivers of economic performance. Thermochemical pathways which included Hydroprocessed Esters and Fatty Acids (HEFA) generally exhibited lower average MSPs than biochemical routes, reflecting higher carbon conversion efficiencies and more mature processing technologies. From a sustainability perspective, most lignocellulosic SAF pathways achieve substantial GHG emission reductions (approximately 70–95%) relative to conventional jet fuel. Electrified and hydrogen-integrated systems show the greatest potential for deep decarbonization, though these benefits are accompanied by higher capital intensity and increased reliance on low-carbon electricity.

By explicitly coupling economic performance with environmental outcomes, this work reveals the central trade-offs that shape lignocellulosic SAF systems and emphasizes the value of integrated assessment frameworks for sustainability-oriented decision-making. The findings suggest that achieving scalable, low-carbon aviation fuels will require coordinated advances in conversion efficiency, renewable hydrogen integration, feedstock logistics, and durable policy incentives, rather than reliance on scale expansion alone.