Can EU Crops Actually Green Aviation? Barely, Study Says

A Cerulogy study finds EU intermediate biofuel crops can meet just 4% of aviation demand by 2050

8 May 2026

Two crop categories that the EU added to its approved biofuel feedstock lists in 2024 are too limited in scale and too uncertain in their environmental benefits to meaningfully support aviation's clean fuel targets, according to new research published this week by consultancy Cerulogy and commissioned by campaign group Transport & Environment.

Both qualify under Annex IX of the EU's Renewable Energy Directive and receive preferential treatment as fuel suppliers scramble to meet binding sustainable aviation fuel mandates that took effect in 2025. One category covers intermediate crops grown between main harvest cycles; the other, oilseeds cultivated on severely degraded land.

Even under optimistic assumptions, these crops could supply just 4 per cent of the bloc's aviation biofuel demand by 2050.

Environmental risks compound the supply problem. Disrupted crop rotations, unchecked fertiliser use, and weak land-use monitoring can quietly erode the carbon savings these feedstocks are assumed to deliver. Indirect land-use change, where food production is displaced onto natural land elsewhere, remains a live concern under existing rules.

"Without robust safeguards, Europe risks resurrecting the food-versus-fuel failures it spent years trying to leave behind." – Transport & Environment biofuels policy manager

Proposed remedies include a quantity cap modelled on limits already applied to waste cooking oils, strict controls on fertiliser inputs, and a requirement that whatever sustainable supply does exist be reserved for aviation and maritime use rather than road transport.

Longer term, T&E argues that synthetic fuels produced from green hydrogen offer the more credible path. Crop-based options, where permitted at all, should be time-limited and tightly governed.

For airlines and fuel suppliers that have already incorporated these feedstocks into compliance strategies, timing is uncomfortable. Brussels is expected to publish guidance soon on how these crops count toward renewable energy targets. Cerulogy's findings will be difficult to set aside.