State Policies Could Pave the Way for Sustainable Aviation Fuels

Solar Impulse SI2 (Photo – Milko Vuille)

Aviation is a significant and growing source of greenhouse gas emissions. But the federal government in the United States has failed to address it so far.

By Ethan Elkind

In response, some state policymakers and advocates are considering legal measures to effectively require the use of sustainable aviation fuels, which emit less carbon than traditional jet fuel when burned—and in some cases, can eliminate these emissions altogether.

Opponents will likely argue that such state-based initiatives conflict with federal law. A new report from UC Berkeley Law’s Center for Law, Energy and the Environment (CLEE), State of Aviation Decarbonization: State Policy Options to Regulate Carbon Emissions from Aviation and Federal Preemption Risk, provides an in-depth analysis of these legal issues with respect to three potential state policy approaches:

1. Regulation via a low carbon or clean fuel standard, which creates a carbon intensity target for all fuels—aviation included—where low-carbon fuels that fall below the threshold generate credits that can be sold, while fuels above the benchmark create deficits.
2. State and local plans that implement the federal Clean Air Act, specifically indirect source rules on airports that would require reductions in co-pollutants from airport mobile sources, including aircraft emissions due to burning high-carbon fuels.
3. State authority to tax and impose fees on high-carbon aviation fuel to discourage its consumption and generate revenue to fund the use and deployment of lower-carbon alternatives.

The report ultimately concludes that a low carbon fuel standard regulation would provide the greatest potential impact on sustainable aviation but entails the most legal risk among the three approaches, while increased taxation or fees on high-carbon jet fuel could have a potentially significant impact on sustainable aviation fuel if revenues support deployment of low-carbon alternatives, with a moderate risk of federal preemption.

Overall, State of Aviation Decarbonization finds that well-designed state initiatives have a strong chance of surviving legal challenges and offers strategies to reduce the likelihood of successful challenges.

> Download the report at this link.