[Tacoma, Washington, USA, 2026 August 28]

In his address, Gillard argued that while sustainability remains a core pillar, the primary driver for aviation's energy transition must be security of supply. He contrasted vulnerable global supply chains with SUSTAERO’s localized approach, which relies on short, highly secure supply paths.

“The primary [issue] that I am always focused on for SAF is not sustainability—it's security of supply,” said Gillard. “With these short, simple supply chains, no more than 100 miles from our site to our furthest supplier. We have an uninterruptible supply. We don't have to go through any Strait of Hormuz. We don't have to cross any borders where suddenly 50% tariffs are announced. We don't have to deal with any of that.”

Gillard highlighted Canada's natural advantages, including its position as a global leader in commercial forestry, abundant low-carbon hydroelectric power, and commercially available fresh water. A central theme of his talk focused on SUSTAERO's strategy of "fuel origami," the repurposing of former pulp and paper mill sites into commercial SAF facilities.

Key operational highlights from Gillard’s presentation include:

Site Infrastructure: SUSTAERO’s initial plant leverages a recently warm-idled mill site with 100 MW of existing electrical substation capacity, a gigawatt of electricity already delivered to the property, three indoor rail bays, direct rail access, and a nearby deep-water port.

Feedstock & Local Impact: The plant utilizes residual woody biomass (including forestry residues and mill waste) from nine local suppliers who currently lack local offtakers and face 13-hour transport routes to dispose of waste.

Technology Stack: SUSTAERO utilizes a fully TRL-9 bankable process integrating NextChem’s commercial-scale gasification, Sasol’s Fischer-Tropsch synthesis, Topsoe balance-of-plant/hydrotreating, and integrated electrolysis to supplement necessary hydrogen levels.

Production & Offtake: Target initial output is set for 144,000 tonnes per year (182 million litres) by 2030, split into 64% eSAF destined for European markets and 36% bioSAF targeted for Toronto and Vancouver airports. The site holds the potential to scale fourfold to 576,000 tonnes per annum (730 million litres).

Carbon Intensity & Economics: The facility’s low carbon intensity (CI) score of 8.79 enables the generation of 477,000 Canadian Clean Fuel Regulations (CFR) credits annually, alongside stackable Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) credits in British Columbia.

Gillard concluded by emphasizing the broader value proposition of sustainable aviation fuel, framing it around the six S’s of SUSTAERO SAF: "Sustainable, Safe, Scalable, Socially-Responsible, Sovereign, and Secure."

About SUSTAERO

SUSTAERO is building the world’s first billion-litre wood waste to Sustainable Aviation Fuel capacity, driven by Fortune 100 leadership and its proprietary SOAR™ process. SUSTAERO'S SAF has extremely high security of supply due to simple, sustainable, uninterruptible supply chains. Please visit www.SUSTAERO.ca to learn more or contact PR@SUSTAERO.ca.

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