Oil major Chevron is strengthening ties with non-oil industries for new biofuels businesses in the United States. Actively partnering with Delta Airlines and Google, a major IT company, for sustainable aviation fuel (SAF). And also, entering into a business alliance with a major grain company, Bunge. It is showing a typical development.
The product division of Chevron U.S.A., a subsidiary of Chevron, and Delta Air Lines and Google have recently agreed to collaborate on tracking SAF test batch emissions data using cloud technology to visualize emissions from SAF fuels.
The test batch will be the sale of SAF produced from biomass-derived raw materials at the El Segundo refinery (capacity of 269,000 barrels per day) to Delta's Los Angeles International Airport.
In addition, Chevron announced in late August that it had agreed with US global recycling company Brightmark to expand the scale of its biomethane JV (joint venture) project, Brightmark RNG Holdings, which produces biomethane from dairy waste. It plans to increase the production volume of JV in 2025 by 10 times compared to 20 years.
At the same time,Chevron and Bunge North America, an agri-business company, announced on September 2 that they have agreed to form a partnership in the business from procurement of raw materials for renewable fuels to refueling. Bunge plans to build soybean oil processing facilities in Destrehan, Louisiana and Cairo, Illinois. Both companies plan to establish an evenly funded JV.
The background to Chevron's aggressive management is that the decarbonization movement has become a global trend and that business performance is on a recovery trend due to the spread of the new coronavirus infection. The company announced its second-quarter 2021 results at the end of July, with net income of $ 3.08 billion from a net loss of $ 8.27 billion in the year-ago quarter.
By the way, on September 9, the Biden administration, which has set a goal of reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to virtually zero by 2050, announced a goal to reduce aviation-related GHG emissions by 20% by 30 years.
As part of this, commercial aircraft will increase production of SAF, increasing the supply of SAF from the current 4.5 million gallons a year to 3 billion gallons by 2030. As a result, the US government will provide $ 4.3 billion to affiliated companies.
In the biofuel sector in the US, both public-private efforts are in full swing, with the government supporting new investment by each company.
Jiro Arihara
Global Commodity Watcher
