XCF Global to be first public pure-play SAF producer

Sustainable aviation fuel producer XCF Global plans to go public in the coming weeks, which will make the New York-based producer the only publicly traded company in the United States to produce SAF and nothing else. The company acquired Reno, Nev.-based New Rise Renewables, a sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) facility, this year, and is already operational there, with plans to build a sister facility to expand the site’s footprint. The acquisition was part of a $1.8 billion merger deal in March between XCF and special purpose acquisition company Focus Impact BH3 Acquisition. [caption id="attachment_57288620" align="aligncenter" width="744"] (Courtesy/XCF Global)[/caption] XCF also plans to build SAF plants in Wilson, N.C., and Fort Myers, Fla. It expects to produce 38 million gallons of SAF this year, scaling to 160 million gallons by 2028. The company projects 2025 revenue of $331.4 million. The company has a patent pending on its SAF plant design, which it plans to replicate with future facilities, whether built from scratch or acquired, XCF Chief Executive Mihir Dange told Cargo Facts . Making SAF XCF Global’s SAF, made through hydroprocessed esterification of fatty acids (HEFA), can reduce carbon emissions by 80% compared with conventional jet fuel, according to the company. A pre-processing facility allows XCF to take in multiple types of feedstock. HEFA uses hydrogen to refine vegetable oils, waste oils and fats into SAF. “That means we take in a lipid, some type of fatty acid, and convert that into sustainable aviation fuel by adding hydrogen to it,” Dange said. “The feedstock that we prefer today is distillers corn oil.” Distilled corn oil, a byproduct of corn ethanol production, is considered a high-quality fat by SAF standards. Cost of SAF Most of XCF’s feedstock comes from the U.S., “which is quite nice with some of the tariff and tariff-related issues that exist today,” Dange said. “It's very much a homegrown U.S. story, which we think fits really nicely into what's happening with the [Trump] administration today,” he said. It is unlikely that SAF will be subjected to tariffs, Dange said. Regardless of tariffs, he believes the U.S. will remain a “producer’s haven.” SAF is two to five times the cost of traditional jet fuel, which has been decreasing in price for the past nine months, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. The monthly average spot price for U.S. Gulf Coast jet fuel in March was $2.07 per gallon , a 20.2% year-over-year decrease. [caption id="attachment_57288619" align="aligncenter" width="1241"] (Cargo Facts)[/caption] “The No. 1 [SAF] cost is feedstock,” Dange said. “Feedstock can cost anywhere from $3 to $5 a gallon, and you don't get 1-to-1 yield, so that is very pricy and not even layering in infrastructure cost, labor cost, corporate overhead." “We continue to figure out how to drive down feedstock costs, which is an overall net accretive to the bottom line,” he said. Barriers to SAF “There is going to be a shortfall of SAF very quickly in a very short period of time,” Dange said. “It really comes down to structural capital as opposed to credits. “Consistent types of bank financing or facilities that you find in other energy-related ecosystems are lagging in SAF because of the nascency of the space and, I think until that becomes a little bit more robust, there is going to be continued difficulty to erect these facilities,” he said. Going public will help XCF raise capital and produce and sell more SAF, Dange said. “Currently it's a cobbled-up capital stack,” he said. “It's very difficult to raise funds from typical sources, so getting facilities up and running isn't that easy.” A second barrier to increasing SAF production and use is the need to develop and perfect the science behind SAF creation. “There's a technological component after the capital component that's quite relevant,” Dange said. Reaching net zero IATA has set a goal for the aviation industry to reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 and industry leaders have touted SAF as the best way to reach that goal. SAF production is expected to reach 2.1 million tonnes in 2025, or 0.7% of total jet fuel production and 13% of global renewable fuel capacity, according to IATA. Between 3,000 and more than 6,500 SAF plants need to be built to enable aviation to reach net zero by 2050, IATA said in December 2024. However, Dange does not believe net zero is reachable with SAF alone. In the next twenty years, he expects to see new types of aircraft entering the market that rely on alternative fuels and technologies as yet undiscovered to eliminate emissions. However, this does not mean the industry should stop investing in SAF, Dange said, quite the opposite. The technologies need to be co-developed to ensure a more sustainable future. “We ourselves, XCF, will not be able to meet the demand of the entire SAF industry,” Dange said. “There is a requirement of 100-times growth over the next twenty-five years, so it requires multiple parties to come in and step up to get this going.”

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