Low-carbon liquid fuels (LCLF) company HAMR Energy has been granted up to $32 million in conditional funding from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) to advance its landmark forestry-to-fuels projects.
Spanning South Australia and Victoria, the projects are anchored by Australia’s first large-scale methanol-to-jet SAF refinery in Port Adelaide. The funding will support engineering and development work across the integrated supply chain, from aggregating plantation forestry residues in the Green Triangle and producing low-carbon methanol through to the production of SAF, renewable diesel and other fuels.
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The projects will strengthen Australia’s fuel security by establishing an integrated domestic supply chain for low-carbon liquid fuels using Australian renewable energy and plantation forestry residues. Anchored by Australia’s first proposed large-scale methanol-to-jet SAF refinery in Port Adelaide, the project would establish sovereign domestic production capability and reduce reliance on imported liquid fuels.
At full scale, HAMR Energy’s projects have the potential to process approximately 600,000 tonnes of plantation forestry residues each year to produce around 300,000 tonnes of low-carbon methanol. The Port Adelaide refinery would convert that methanol into approximately 140 million litres of SAF annually, alongside renewable diesel and other low carbon fuels.
Crucially, this volume of SAF could displace approximately 140 million litres of fossil fuels, abate around 390,000 tonnes of CO2 equivalent per annum and also facilitate approximately 4.5 million economy passenger trips between Adelaide and Melbourne each year.
Feasibility work has been completed and HAMR Energy is progressing into Front-End Engineering Design and further development activities across the supply chain.
HAMR Energy co-founder David Stribley said, “This funding is a significant milestone in Australia building globally competitive domestic SAF industry.
“Our projects bring together plantation forestry residues from the Green Triangle, Australian renewable energy and hydrogen, and proven methanol and refining technologies to produce lower-emissions aviation fuel at commercial scale.
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“The projects have the potential to strengthen Australia’s fuel security, reduce aviation emissions and create skilled jobs across construction, engineering, manufacturing and regional supply chains.”
