Cathay Pacific is launching its pilot Corporate Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) Programme at the Hong Kong International Airport (HKG) — the first of its kind in Asia — to provide allowing the airline's corporate customers to reduce their carbon footprint.

The Hong Kong-based airline is kick-starting the programme with eight corporates as launch customers, including AIA, Airport Authority Hong Kong (AAHK), DHL Global Forwarding, HSBC, Kintetsu World Express (KWE), PwC China, Standard Chartered, and Swire Pacific.

"The programme provides corporate customers the opportunity to reduce their carbon footprint from business travel or airfreight by contributing to the use of SAF uplifted for the first time from Hong Kong International Airport (HKIA) on Cathay Pacific flights," Cathay said.

It added that the launch customers are committed to reducing the climate impact from their business travel and/or airfreight activities by helping to facilitate the wider adoption of renewable energy by the air transport industry through the use of SAF.

"We continue to pioneer our industry's move towards more substantial use of SAF, especially in Asia. Last year, we were among the first carriers in the world to announce a target of 10% SAF for our total fuel use by 2030," Cathay Chief Executive Officer Augustus Tang said, adding that Cathay has made "significant progress" since then and are pleased that uplifting SAF from HKIA is now a reality.

Overwhelming response to SAF use

Tang noted that Cathay has already received a "very enthusiastic response" from other companies aside from the launch customers.

"We see the launch of this Corporate SAF Programme as an important step for us to engage other like-minded organisations, and a first step in sending an important demand signal to the SAF supply chain that there is firm interest in the region, not only from airlines but also the aviation value-chain all the way to end-users for both passenger and cargo transportation," the Cathay chief added.

SAF is considered one of the most important ways to decarbonise airline operations in the next few decades before alternatively powered aircraft can be widely deployed in commercial operations.

Compared to conventional jet fuel, SAF can reduce up to 100% carbon emissions on a lifecycle basis, depending on the SAF technology used.

Cathay said the SAF used for the launch of this programme is made from used cooking oil and animal fat waste made available by Cathay's pilot Corporate SAF Programme fuel suppliers PetroChina and Shell.

It added that the SAF used in this programme will go through the normal aviation-fuelling infrastructure, which provides important learning for developing ongoing regular SAF supply from HKIA in the future.  

Aside from increased usage of SAF, Cathay Pacific's carbon reduction roadmap includes fleet modernisation, operational efficiency improvements, leveraging on emerging technology breakthroughs to decarbonise aviation, and offering carbon offsets through its Fly Greener programme in a bid to achieve its goal of net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.