Travel Daily News
Vicky Karantzavelou
05 November 2025
The European Commission’s Sustainable Transport Investment Plan (STIP) has been recognised as a positive step toward addressing key financing and policy challenges in aviation’s net-zero transition. However, the DESTINATION 2050 alliance* of aviation partners cautions that the plan does not yet provide the scale of support required to accelerate decarbonisation and maintain Europe’s competitiveness.
The plan offers long-awaited signals to strengthen the Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) market, but the sector notes that the level of potential funding does not match the investment needs. Industry estimates show that developing SAF production alone will require 100 billion euros by 2035 – far above what the STIP currently suggests.
DESTINATION 2050 partners welcomed the inclusion of a double-sided auction system to stimulate investment and narrow the cost gap for SAF, as well as the Commission’s intention to streamline financing instruments to support new SAF projects, including advanced biofuels and e-SAF.
* A4E, ACI Europe, ASD, CANSO Europe, ERA
