The Philippines is considering a 1 percent sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) blend mandate by 2030, according to the Department of Energy.

The government's SAF committee, chaired by the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP), made the recommendation. Energy Undersecretary Alessandro Sales outlined the timetable behind the proposal.

"The recommendation is to have a 1 percent SAF mix or mandate by 2030 so it allows for long enough runway before the mandate exceeds. So kung idedevelop, may three to four years to build up the local supply," Sales said.

He added that the country holds resources to produce SAF, positioning the region as both a demand center for buyers and a producer.

Why start at 1 percent?

Sales identified cost as the single biggest obstacle to SAF adoption. The fuel currently trades at three to four times the price of conventional fossil jet fuel, a spread that creates what he called a "chicken-and-egg" problem for would-be investors: producers will not build capacity without guaranteed demand, and buyers will not commit without supply.

The 1 percent mandate is designed to break that cycle.

"So the workaround is to set a mandate of one percent, two percent, and the market ensures the facility can be set up. Eventually, [the] cost can come down," Sales said.

"That's a similar roadmap that we want to follow as well to keep off 'yung mga spark ng industry ng Philippines ng SAF potentially; a mandate may be set," he added.

The department has no estimate yet for the investment required to develop domestic SAF production.

What about feedstock and biofuel?

Beyond aviation fuel, Sales signaled that the Philippines could raise its biofuel blend. Current rules allow only sugarcane molasses derived from sugarcane as feedstock, following talks with international biofuel support bodies on opening up the permitted inputs.

"I think there will be a proposal to amend corn as local feedstock to produce bioethanol," Sales said.

A corn-based feedstock pathway, if adopted, would broaden the agricultural inputs available to Philippine biofuel producers and, by extension, the raw material base for future SAF output.

What happens next?

For now, the 1 percent figure remains a recommendation rather than a finalized regulation. The Energy Department has not published an investment estimate, a feedstock plan or an implementation timeline beyond the 2030 target.

The four-year window before the mandate takes effect is intended to give local producers time to build supply capacity, with the expectation that scaling volumes will gradually compress the price premium against fossil jet fuel.

Whether the Philippines can assemble domestic SAF production within that runway, and at what cost to carriers and passengers, will determine whether the 2030 blend mandate holds or slips.