U.N.-led talks weigh goal to reduce aviation emissions thorough less-polluting fuels. On Friday, a conference in Dubai that the United Nations presides over will close. During this conference, targets are being considered to minimize carbon emissions from international aviation by using less polluting fuel. This comes when a resurgence in traffic has put airlines in the hot seat about their environmental impact.

Airlines are under pressure to lower the emissions from flights after participating in an ICAO assembly last year and joining the industry in setting a net-zero emissions target for the sector by the year 2050.

The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) is hosting the third Conference on Aviation and Alternative Fuels (CAAF), which started this week. The COP28 United Nations Climate Summit will begin in Dubai on November 30.

Delegates at the CAAF, coming from over 100 different countries, are now discussing methods to increase the availability of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), which may be manufactured from resources such as discarded cooking oil. SAF is essential to reducing emissions from aircraft, but it is still prohibitively expensive and in limited supply.

Major airlines and aircraft manufacturers want the conference in Dubai to establish a global objective of attaining about an 80% decrease in aviation fuel carbon intensity from using SAF by the year 2050, compared with the intensity of traditional fossil fuels.

Haldane Dodd, executive director of the industry Air Transport Action Group (ATAG), told attendees on Thursday that such a promise would “show how aviation can get things done and be an important signal to the COP28 meeting taking place just down the road starting next week.” COP28 will be taking place “just down the road starting next week,” Dodd said.

Environmental organizations have encouraged the Climate Action and Agriculture Foundation (CAAF) to promote “high environmental and social integrity standards.”

Even though they are not legally obligatory, such worldwide promises have moral weight and the potential to motivate crucial investments required to ramp up the production of SAF, which now accounts for less than one percent of total jet fuel.

According to estimations provided by the industry, to reach the sector’s net zero emissions target, finance for SAF capital development will need to range between $1.45 trillion and $3.2 trillion.

To strengthen SAF production in regions other than the United States and Europe, it is necessary to make it easier for developing nations to access various forms of finance, another conference purpose.

According to Francis Mwangi, a senior planning official at Kenya’s Civil Aviation Authority, the African nation requires funds to research the economic benefits of domestic SAF production and use an ancient refinery situated in Mombasa to make the fuel. This is something that may be accomplished by using the refinery.

“We are ready to move and produce SAF in Kenya,” Mwangi added. “We are ready to move.”