2024 - 1st ACT-SAF Workshop on “SAF Direct Supply Lines (DSL)” in Mombasa, Kenya

Between 30.09.24-02.10.24 over 200 participants from 14 African States joined the 1^st ACT-SAF Workshop for Africa organised by the EU funded ACT-SAF EU Africa-India Project (Capacity Building for Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAF) eligible under the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA)) together with KCAA. 

The main focus of the workshop was to discuss the key factors to achieve the viability and bankability of SAF Direct Supply Lines (DSL = SAF production project from feedstock to end-users), highly relevant discussion for the profile of the participants that actively participated in the discussions (feedstock producers/providers, potential local SAF producers, all CAAs from the 14 African countries covered by the project, and a number of relevant Ministries to enable SAF value chain in a country).

The workshop, coordinated with ICAO ACT-SAF Team, counted on the support and contribution from other SAF partners, such as NL, GIZ, ASCENT 93 Project, and showcased the need of close coordination and collaboration to maximise outputs of the supporting initiatives.

During the discussions it was evident that Africa, despite of all the challenges, is showing very positive developments with a number of local SAF production projects being formulated and featuring very promising outcomes. 

The financial institutions participating in the event (e.g. World Bank, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, SMBC) contributed with their perspective on key de-risking factors to enable financing SAF production projects (e.g. strong and long-term SAF policies, offtake agreements, sound technical production projects with relevant partnerships) and showed their interest to explore supporting SAF related investments in Africa. 

The workshop was organised back-to-back to the 2^nd Kenya National SAF Committee (NSC) in Kenya (event also supported by the ACT-SAF EU Africa-India Project), allowing to carry over the earlier discussions into the Kenyan context for different Technical Working Groups under the NSC. 

The output of the 2^nd NSC gives now clear direction to Kenyan Stakeholders and to the Governmental Departments involved on the next steps to achieve local SAF production in the coming years. 

The possibility to visit the Mombasa Refinery and Pipelines system was the perfect cherry on top of a very intense but very fruitful week and all participants are very thankful to KCAA and KPRL for facilitating this fieldtrip! 

The EU is committed to continue supporting SAF developments in Africa through technical cooperation projects and exploring possible greater investments to make SAF a wide-spread reality in the Continent. EASA is thrilled to be the implementing partner of this projects and looks forward to intensify the engagement and coordination of the countries and supporting partner to maximise the outcomes of these collaborations. 

Big thanks to KCAA, EU, ICAO ACT-SAF Team, AFCAC and to all other contributing partners (e.g. ASCENT, GIZ, KPRL) and to all participants for their great and essential contributions!!