The International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) has published a Netherlands-focused case study examining how policy tools could narrow the price premium that has kept sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) from displacing conventional kerosene at scale.

The report, titled "Reducing the cost gap for sustainable aviation fuel through policy intervention," enters the European SAF debate as airlines and fuel suppliers operate under binding blending mandates.

The Netherlands introduced a national SAF obligation in 2023, requiring fuel uplifted at Dutch airports to contain a minimum share of SAF. The Dutch mandate is set to rise annually, and non-compliant fuel suppliers face financial penalties designed to make the obligation enforceable rather than aspirational.

The framework allows suppliers to meet obligations through physical SAF blending or, in some cases, certificate-based compliance mechanisms.

The Dutch scheme sits alongside the EU-wide ReFuelEU Aviation regulation, which sets escalating blending obligations across member-state airports and includes specific sub-targets for synthetic e-fuels from 2030 onward.

ICCT, a research organization that has produced multiple analyses on aviation decarbonization, frames the cost gap as a function that policy — rather than voluntary corporate offtake alone — can compress.

The Dutch case is particularly relevant because the country combines a national blending mandate with EU-level regulation, providing layered policy pressure on fuel suppliers. ICCT's aviation work has previously examined lifecycle emissions accounting and the role of synthetic fuels, giving the new study a comparable methodology base.

What is the cost gap at issue?

SAF trades at a meaningful premium to fossil jet fuel. Producers cite feedstock availability, refinery capital costs, and limited long-term offtake agreements as drivers of the differential.

Airlines argue that, without policy support, the cost passes through to ticket prices or erodes already thin margins on short-haul European operations. The differential also affects the competitiveness of SAF against other low-carbon transport fuels competing for the same waste-feedstock supply. Used cooking oil, animal fats, and agricultural residues all compete for collection networks, raising input costs for SAF producers.

What tools does the title imply?

The phrase "policy intervention" typically covers blending mandates, tax credits, capital grants for production capacity, contracts-for-difference, and public procurement of SAF for government travel.

The Dutch framework already includes a blending obligation; ReFuelEU adds separate sub-targets for synthetic e-fuels. For the Netherlands specifically, the policy mix also incorporates the EU Emissions Trading System — in which airlines surrender allowances covering the CO2 in the fuel they burn — plus a national CO2 levy on aviation. Both instruments raise the effective cost of fossil jet fuel and narrow the relative gap to SAF on a per-litre basis.

Why the Netherlands as a case study?

The Netherlands hosts the Port of Rotterdam, one of Europe's largest refining and bunkering hubs, and is home to SAF production and feedstock-handling infrastructure operated by several major fuel suppliers.

The country also represents one of the more mature European SAF regulatory environments. KLM, the Dutch flag carrier, has publicly committed to increasing SAF uptake, providing a domestic demand-side counterpart to the policy analysis.

What to watch

Whether the ICCT report quantifies a specific euro-per-litre gap reduction achievable through each policy lever — and whether it sets out the fiscal cost to Dutch and EU taxpayers of sustaining those interventions — will shape how carriers and fuel producers engage with its findings.

Airlines will look for evidence that policy can reduce SAF prices without imposing new compliance burdens. Producers will look for evidence that policy delivers durable demand beyond 2030. The case study enters that discussion with the Netherlands' blending-mandate track record — now in its second year — as its empirical baseline.