We set that 12.5% target about five years ago, and this was before there was a soft mandate in Europe. So the fifth or 55 legislation hadn't been published yet. And at the time, we weren't seeing the level of production, command stream, and a clear marker was needed to be set. That far as a soft would be there into the future. So through building on and relying on our key suppliers in key regions, we've got access to about 80% of that. But I think there's still elements of that that are going to be at risk just because the South Market probably hasn't developed in Europe in the way we maybe thought it would back five years ago. So I think challenges definitely are going to arise as we go and try and meet that target. Welcome to Sustainability in the air. The world's first podcast dedicated to sustainable aviation. I'm your host, Shashank Megham, the CEO of Simplifying. On this show, I speak with aviation leaders, innovators, and policymakers driving real action, separating the signal from the noise to spotlight what's truly moving the industry forward. The same focus that is at the heart of our new book, Sustainability in the air, volume two. In it, "Durk Singer and I" takes stock of how far the industry has come and how far we still need to go. With the global carbon budget potentially running out by 2032, the clock is ticking. But the most promising solutions today aren't just environmentally sound. They are economically superior as well. From staff and contraindomigation to direct air capture. The book offers a practical roadmap for aviation's journey to net zero. Get your copy today. Link in the show notes. (upbeat music) My guest today is Stephen Fitzgerald, Director of Sustainability and Finance at Ryanair, Europe's largest local stair line. Stephen sits at the intersection of climate policy, field markets, and airline economics, overseeing Ryanair's strategy on SAF, EU emissions trading, and fleet efficiency. In this episode, we unpack why Ryanair set SAF targets ahead of the EU mandate. How carbon pricing is shaping airline costs and what it takes to decarbonize aviation while keeping fairs low. Stephen, it's good to be speaking with you and finally having one of the world's leading local stair lines on the podcast, talking about sustainability because local stair lines typically target growth. Ryanair has been a growth leader globally, a profit leader, and here you are trying to save some carbon footprint while pursuing growth. I define yourself in a fix, Stephen. - No, I think that's just the nature of operating in Europe now. We're gonna be leading on sustainability. We operate in a highly regulated market in the EU where the vast majority of our flights are covered by carbon pricing at a really high level. And we're also covered by SAF mandate. So we're gonna be leading on sustainability as well and leading on SAF procurement. So it does feel a bit different to normal low cost carrier way of doing things, but I mean, that's just the way we're operating now. - Well, I think you're a bit, being a bit humble here because you're not just complying with the EU men. You've actually said a 12.5% target for SAF usage for 2030, which actually exceeds EU mandates. So contrary to popular belief, surprise, surprise. I know it's not taking a box here. It's actually going beyond why. - Yeah, I think so. So we set that 12 and a half percent target about five years ago. And this was before those SAF mandate in Europe. So the fifth or 55 legislation hadn't been published yet, but it was because we recognize SAF as the most scalable decarbonization solution for aviation. And at the time, we weren't seeing the level of production command stream and a clear marker was needed to be set. That far as a SAF would be there into the future. So that's a bit of background on why we set that 12.5% target for 2030. Through building on and relying on our key suppliers in key regions, we've got about 80% of that. We've got access to about 80% of that. So that's a good thing. But I think there's still elements of that that are going to be at risk just because the SAF market probably hasn't developed in Europe in the way we maybe thought it would back five years ago. So I think challenges definitely are going to arise as we go and try and do that target. - Interesting. One question, why the focus on SAF? - Well, I mean, SAF isn't the only thing we're looking at. So we've set a target that's being validated by the SPTI. So that's an emission intensity target to reduce our CO2 per passenger kilometer by 27% by the year '31. So that's trying to get us down to 48 grams of CO2 per passenger. And if you can think about Ryan Ari, you think about efficiency. So we're already leading in that space already. So SAF will deliver about 50% of those emission savings. But fleet renewal plays a huge part as well. And we were only in a position to set that SPTI target when we had completed our order for 300 max 10 aircraft. And so those aircraft are going to be used apart for growth but also part for fleet renewal. So retiring older aircraft on the max 10 should be able to deliver 20% fuel saving while being able to transport 20% more passenger. So it's kind of a double-plot me benefit there in terms of our intensity target. So that was one key thing to SAF being a drop in fuel. No infrastructure changes needed at airports. That was all part of why SAF is going to play an important role. But I mean, when I think about it now, there's lots of other projects that will help us decarbonize. So we're retrofitting our 737 NG fleet with split scum to our winglets. We're looking at variable cost index instead of setting a fixed speed. It will take into account the engines on their particular aircraft and weather conditions. We're going to increase our use of GPUs on the ground. We're not going to be installing Wi-Fi's on planes with drag obviously happening. Yes, we heard that across multiple news outlets and there was a rather famous person kind of upset with Ryanair that you will not introduce Wi-Fi on board free Wi-Fi. Free Wi-Fi? No. Again, it all comes out to the focus that Ryanair has on fuel efficiency. We have a sustainability committee that meets monthly that has the key people across the group. So CFO, CTO, COO are all playing a part in terms of looking at fuel efficiency. And when we consider different projects including things like Wi-Fi and plane, planes, the fuel cost and additional fuel burn plays a part in any decision making. So that was one of the things that was considered with that. So I sense a theme here, Stephen, which once again, it's very aligned with the LCC ethos, the Ryanair ethos, which is let's bring down the fuel burn per seat down, the intensity you mentioned. How does this balance with the covenants and intensity versus the total emission of a flight or total emission of Ryanair? Do you-- how do you balance that growth? Because the airlines' growth curve is usually faster than the fuel intensity decline curve. I think that's going to remain into the future. I think Ryanair has come through over the last few years as double digits increases in terms of growth on an annual basis. And you're not going to see the same declines in terms of emission intensity. What we can see is that as Southmand 18 increase across Europe, the will come a tipping point when we'll be able to reduce our CO2 per passenger at a fast rate. And that's coming up. That's coming towards the end of the decade, as we increase our use of South. It is a really interesting play between navigating the cost premium, South, and maintaining the low cost carrier model. I think maybe to put it all in context. I mean, right now, by seeing setting on Ryanair, we'll use about 5.5 million tons of Jeff fuel in a given year. And we'll be flying to 36 countries, at 220 different airports. And so 90% of our flights are covered by ETS. So we're going to expect next year to span between 1.4 and 1.5 billion trying to comply with the emission trading system and soft costs. So there's a huge cost burden there for Ryanair. And for, say, for a family of four, from a return trip from Dublin to the Canteries, it's going to cost an additional 120 euro. And maybe to, again, put that in context. that finally chose to fly to Morocco instead of
the calories. I mean, they're not going to be paying any of these costs. So it's an interesting play that needs to be considered in the context of how we think about compliance costs with ETS and South. And again, we've seen the price of EUA's increased 50% in the last nine months. And look, this is actually primarily through speculative investment funds rather than compliance fundamentals. And really what we're seeing now is that there was an EUA auction last week. And it was, I think there was 9.2 million tons of CO2 being auctioned. The speculative fires wanted 10.4 million tons. So that's a challenge as a low cost carrier that we're always trying to play against. ETS costs are about 14 times the cost of course here. So at least with course here, you have your buying environmental projects. But with ETS, some governments might invest that in the environment, but not a lot to, and like we have the example with Ireland where the government uses the revenues generated from ETS to put it into buzzer and so put it into a kind of semi-state on bus companies. So you're not getting environmental benefits that you could actually point to like you can with course here. So there's a challenge here where you're trying to minimize your compliance costs, but also maximize the sustainability benefits that you can achieve. So the link between ETS and South is a bit clearer these days because the EU has what's called the feats mechanism and that provides a South ETS allowances. So where you're picking up South out of European airport, you're going to get South ETS allowances back. So that's a play that we can try and reduce our ETS compliance costs while also increasing our use of South. And we just need to be really smart about where we choose to get the South. What type of South we're going to pick up because that all plays back to what real benefit can we get here? How much of the carbon emission reductions can we really achieve and try and do it in a super smart way to reduce costs and maximize benefits? I love it. Thank you. That was ETS 101. ETS 101. I really appreciate how you explained it. I think you've been very proactive in addressing this in the actual execution of the strategy as well. UNI Glass met at the Categon launch in Belfast in person, which is an e-fuel supplier based out of Northern Ireland. Now they're not the only one you're partnering with. If you've got the entire plethora from Shell to others, tell me how are you thinking about this ecosystem and specifically about Categon, which is sort of a newish player, isn't it? Yeah, Categon is a super interesting one. The God and novel idea where you'd be able to generate a South generator from Bionist. And you're able to do it out various locations across closer to the ecosystem where we really benefit from, so closer to renewable energy and closer to airports that you operate from. So I think it was the novel idea that came about from Categon is super interesting, especially when we're looking at a market that's super short on 2G and 3G staff that we need more of these innovative ideas. And I think that's what Categon can be. We were first introduced to Categon through the research that's actually being performed by Trinity College in Dublin. So Trinity College operate a role as the Yadas pre-certification screening tool. So Categon were one of the first to go through that. So any new South candidates will have to go through a process where pre-screening is done. So I think there was a really good link in between research that we sponsored and what we're hearing about what Categon can actually produce. So there are going to be, it's going to be a new way of doing things I think where potentially you could mix it with other companies where you could potentially plan produce and blend closer to the airports. And again, that should produce carbon emission reduction benefits. But in terms of the kind of wider ecosystem of companies that we're dealing with, we really focused on looking across our key markets. You see, who were the early movers? Who were the market leaders on South. And I think of when we chose to partner with it. So it looks like we focus on three real things. One was credibility. Does the fields of fire have a strong track record in renewable fields? So the road field space has been dealing with this for a long time. Second criteria we probably considered was Gail and the link back to our network. So when I think of any lift in Italy, Italy is our biggest market. And any of our the biggest soft producers in that market and our biggest supplier of conventional aviation fuel. So it's a natural link to pair up with them. And then the third element would probably be ambition. So when we've looked at these deals, we've looked at multiple pathways being explored. We're not just limited to half a soft 2G and 3G software. It's going to be part of these these road maps. And these are what the suppliers want to do as well. So I think those three elements were key when choosing who to partner with. And I think the diversification also reduces supply risk, Austria's competition and in terms of pricing as the market mature as we haven't really seen that yet. I love the mix here. I love how you're focusing not just on mature players producing today, like or who can help the world field services, but also betting on those big potential like Categen. Categen of course is a very good case study that came out of the Trinity College Dublin. You have a partnership with them too. If I'm not wrong, tell me about this research into the soft certification process that you're working with on Trinity College. Yeah, so research that's been formed there I think is really important. It's going to be powerful. I think it's going to benefit the entire industry. It's not going to just help Ryanair. In terms of this specific piece on soft certification, one of the biggest I think the most significant barrier to entry for new soft candidates is this specification approval. So the process of approval can be expensive. It's a long one. There's a huge cost involved. The volume of fuel required is high and the time for approval can mean there's certain potential soft candidates that will just pull out of it because they'll just favor using their product for less challenging and lower risk markets. So what Trinity's pre-certification tools can do is they can predict viscosity, density, surface tension of soft candidates within a 5% threshold using only one gram of soft. So that avoids the needs and huge costs to generate huge amounts of soft to go through the certification process. So what it does is it de-risks the process for new soft candidates. It enables a lower barrier to entry and I think that will help accelerate soft production. I think the benefits will flow to the industry when the need for 2G and 3G soft intensifies because I mean 1G soft is already de-risked. But that's where the link back to, as I said, the Belfast based company, Catering comes in. So they were one of the first, I think the first company to go through the pre-screen process for the soft as I said, produced by a hydrogen, by a genocarbonyl dioxide from waste biomass. So look, I think it's really important work. But it's not the only thing that the Trinity are looking at with us. I mean, they really do have some of the best in class research going on there. So one of the other things on the soft side is they're looking at the study of carbon-lifes, life cycle analysis. And that's across the entire value chain. So I think if you're looking at bringing staff in huge distances, so if you're taking staff from Asia or feed sucks coming in huge distances to meet European mandates, I think the words that they'll do will give a real view on the environmental impact of that stuff. They will look at cradle-to-grade life cycle emissions. So I think that's super important as well. Very interesting. Usually I'm quite hard on airlines working with universities and I feel that, you know, they're just sticking the can down the road. That's the, let's do research and let's not do other things. But here, I think it's quite commendable, I believe, your commitment with this Trinity College Research Center now totals 2.5 million euros through till 2030. Is that right? Oh, it will be actually before it, by 2030, yeah. Oh, yeah. Okay, now that's that's significant. And I'm just very curious, how do you pitch this internally? Because I know the culture within the Aussies. So you've got to see an ROI and you're saying, "Hey, I'm going to fund this research center for 4 million euros. I don't know the ROI. You're going to be saving more than 4 million euros. Are you going to be making more than 4 million euros there?" I think it's a longer term play. And to be honest, I think this research has already paid for itself. Given the role that Trinity has, Adiasa, in terms of bringing new South candidates on. When you think about what our fuel bill will be next year in the billions, I think it's a really small investment which could pay by huge dividends. It will benefit, as I say, the entire ecosystem.
system, airlines, airports, fuel suppliers, fuel producers, apertures, I think everyone will benefit on the back of the research that's being conducted there. And yeah, it's a small call, so we'll pay back big when the SAP mandates kick up and 2G soft becomes part of the mandates from in the UK from 2027 and in Europe, 3G coming in later in 2030. Thank you once again, we appreciate the perspective there. You of course have a background managing fuel price exposure. Yet, you know, the cost of SAP between 1G, 2G was a 3G varies dramatically. How do you navigate the cost premium of SAP while ensuring that you're not turning over passengers? You know, you're talking about how much euros it can add per ticket. Yeah, I think it's interesting just the markets that we're operating in. So when you think about Riner, it's EU, UK, that we're predominantly operating in. And I think the mandated South market operates very differently to the voluntary markets. We do an annual tender process where poor these suppliers will look to win volumes at the 220 airports that we fly from. And so they'll come to us. We're typically agnostic as part of them. Mandate the markets as to the type of SAP with some key caveats with Pichal Tachon. But the mandated 2% SAP can be delivered across the year on a mass balance basis, which means it doesn't need to be delivered to any airport that we fly from strangely enough, right? But it's absolutely key for us that the supplier is delivering the SAP to an airport that we operate from and I sound really basic, but that's the way it is. And then we get into the supplier credentials and what they're looking at in terms of their SAP production. Are they an early mover? Have they secured their supply of SAP yet? Where is its source? What does pricing look like? What documentation will we receive? Are they even listed on ISEC, the certification body to be able to issue documentation? So that's the first consideration that we'll make. And so typically that will be beat for have a SAP. But we're not seen 2G and 3G SAP come on board yet, but we wanted to because going back to the points that I made on feet. Feats offers you a benefit here when you pick up more advanced types of SAP. So the more advanced type of SAP you get, the bigger the benefit you ultimately receive. So because we operate under EU ETS, if we pick up third generation SAP, so parateliquid SAP will receive 95% of the price differential back. So we really have to engage our fuel suppliers understands where they are with their development, understand when they can get production online and really 3G SAP are only seeing it in test right now. 2G SAP is slightly different, but still not really at the levels where you could point it and say deliver huge quantities to a particular airport. So for decision to go with 1G, 2G, 3G SAP and my role with with in finance will come back to where can we get these types of SAP delivered by the most credible SAP partner at the most cost effect of price to the right location in the market sub we operate from. I want to double click on that 95% back, you know, if you invest in 3G SAP right now. Correct me if I'm wrong, I believe there's a limited fund and the faster you go fly for it, the sooner you get that and once it runs out, it runs out. So does that mean would you advise there like to go run sign for e-fuel and 3G SAP right away is there an incentive here? Well, you have to get so you're absolutely right as you normally are. There's 20 million allowances that run out by the end of the decade, but when they're used, they're used. So I was surprised actually last year in 2024 to see the quantum of those feet, soft allowances, the amount that we're actually claimed and used it shocked me in the year before. How many other use I'm guessing that this is public data? It's yeah, it's public data, but there was hundreds of thousands used hundreds of thousands and it's 20 million. Yeah, exactly. So there's nothing in place. There are lines that are not yet acting or no longer. Well, they can't get the 3G soft to really take advantage of it. I think that's why one of the points that we would advocate for is if you really want to spur soft development and super and turbocharged soft, something needs to be done on the feets, these switches, kind of get extended and kind of get expanded. So can you can you put more focus on the 3G soft to really scale it? Can you give extended allowances out to 2040 and really make it that the airlines wouldn't be put out at a real disadvantage if they moved early themselves and locked in with a staff producer on a multi-year agreement? Because I think that's going to stop airlines from doing certain off takes if they if they won't they don't know the price they don't know if they'll be out of pocket but if they did have a backstop in knowing that feets would be there to support them, I think that could really turbocharged soft production. One clarification here, these allowances, do you get them back when the first drop of staff goes in the wind or do you get them back when you order it? No, you get them back even later than last year, you get them back the year after you submit your ETS submission. So if I do, if I pick up eFUELS in 2025, I have to wait until third quarter of 26 to get the benefit back. But do you still pay the EU ETS fee first, a friend in the negative refund? Is this like a cash back scheme? Yeah, the DTS works as a company, you have to buy the allowances and I have them in advance and then you'll be able to benefit the following year with the SAP ETS allowances, reducing your exposure to follow on your. Well, this has been a masterclass, by the way, you're driving so I'm so happy I'm speaking to someone who knows real parking in depth here, which is my wide in mind, running out just just a context when I do have an airline CEO and airport CEO on this podcast, it's much more strategic and much more high level than an envision. So I'm loving this conversation where we can actually, you know, peel back some of these layers and dive a little deeper. Good. It's great to see Ryan air, you know, turbocharging the use of SAP, you're getting in early, you know the incentives that are there, you're making this work. But what tough choices do you believe the industry must make to actually turbochar it's SAP development? Is it just about airlines signaling by buying SAP? Is that enough or do you think more needs to be done? More definitely needs to be done. I think outside of the extension of a feeds the pace of new staff production capacity in Europe probably hasn't been there. So governments need to to step in. And I think there's an early movers coalition, which was announced last year, which is meant to help accelerate the use of third generation staff. So hopefully that's one thing that can really step in and help get that open running because it's really not there at the minute. But targeted reliefs for feedstock, I think are another way that the government could step in to help. I think in general, there's been a bit of market paralysis. So SAP suppliers have paused certain investments plans haven't been getting to FID. Some of this I think has been brought about by a wait and see approach to the use of the revenue certainly mechanism. So the UK announced a revenue certainly mechanism, which would be kind of a body that would sit in the middle between producers and off takers. And they help guarantee producers revenues to get them to a final investment decision. The EU has now started looking at a similar system. But in reality, what can happen is that well, nobody wants to lock in and engage on a long offtake agreement because the wait and see will probably the cost be through the revenue certainly mechanism. So I think South pricing is going to remain stubbornly high unless we see something take place there. I also think that while the market is long, have a staff right now, I think it's it could turn and turn short. And I think that's going to be due to Monday starting and other jurisdictions, which will just put pressure on the amount of being of SAP being produced and being able to get delivered to the EU. And then there's also certain regulatory rules coming in around anti-dumping directive in Europe, which is going to prevent staff coming in from outside Europe coming in. So there's certain things that the EU could look at to prevent to help accelerate staff coming into the market and help bring limited production capacity online. I appreciate you bringing this perspective in because I did want to get your thoughts on policy. What do you think is the best policy measure that works for the entire ecosystem? Is it the refuel EU ETS mandate? Is it the
UK, uh, revenue guarantee or is there a third better, uh, ideal case scenario you would like? Um, I think like, when I think of the refuel mandate, I mean, that's a clear signal. Like, airlines have to pick it up. There's a customer on the end of it and 100% of the cost from the fuel supply gets passed on to the airlines. Airlines can't pass on all that cost, right? So you think for a fuel supplier, refuel EU should be the perfect policy to really help scale production because there's something on the other end of it. But it just hasn't happened. We've seen investments being being paused. And I need them when I think of eSafe. I mean, like, Europe again should be a really favorable location to start if you'll production because the mandates have high penalties. There's a clean electricity grid there and there's a customer pace that that has to get it. So it's a, it's a strange one by refuel hasn't had, has, almost paused certain types of, of SAP production. And, um, I think maybe it comes back to how unrealistic the longer term, uh, SAP GODS might be, uh, within the policy. The revenue certainly mechanism, I think I can't really talk to it until it goes live and it's not going live until, uh, in sometime in, in 2026. But I think that could really help spur growth because it de-risks, um, the investment for the SAP producer. There's a bit of price clarity as well, which is, is key for airlines. If we're going about trying to plan calls and minimize risk, that will help. So I think the revenue certainly, you make them as I think is a, is a wait and see, but it could be something really positive to, to help spur some growth. Very good. Um, once again, I appreciate the clarity here, you're providing in these policies. We have spoken a lot about SAP, but going back to that research at Trinity College, I believe they're also researching zero carbon propulsion, as well as non-CO2 emissions for you, especially the latter can be acted on today. So how do these technologies factor into the overall mix for the decouvernization would map right now? Look, I think continuing to advance research on zero propulsion is needed. It doesn't feed into our road maps. So when I think of scalable solutions for commercial airlines, I think it's going to take a lot longer to get zero propulsion in the mix there, given those constraints at airports, there's huge complexity, and I'm talking about with hydrogen, the need to carry four times the space, and for say, battery operated, the extra weight that those batteries would need. But I think it's important to really kickstart the research that goes into it. And again, just when I think about what they're looking at, it's how different types of propulsion type, propulsion types and airframe technologies will be incorporated into an aircraft fleet, what the fuel consumption would look like, and what that would do for climate impact. So I think the research will be needed, and what we do is we'll give real world flight planning analysis, how the schedule could be optimized, or multi-propulsion fleet, so you could have part of the fleet running on south, battery for mixed fleet doing shorter sectors, and hydrogen, as well. So it is interesting work that I think could form part of applying towards the end of the century, but it's not something that we take into account when we look at our own decarbonization roadmap right now. On the non-CO2 side, I mean this year we're submitting data as part of Europe's non-CO2 monitoring reporting and verification. I think there'll be a playoff in the future, and that playoff is do you fly longer and burn more fuel and CO2 to avoid airspace and potential generation of contrails, so minimizing the overall climate impact and how that could be worked into your flight planning systems, I think is a really interesting challenge for the industry. But before you consider start changing a flight plan, I think you'd want to be sure that the formation of contrails can be predicted reliably, and that's some of the work that Trinity are going to be undertaking. So again, this is like live research, I think that could benefit the industry. Fair enough, and thanks for being honest and open, because one of the realities is that the the bedrock of Ryanair's operation is a 737, right, and these, the number of these planes is increasing, their fuel efficiency is improving, but that's your worldhouse, right, and that's not changing overnight. That's not changing till 2050, I would say that still remains the workhouse. So I see why your focus is where it is, and I think that's important. Let's talk a little about marketing. Ryanair is known for its brand, Ryanair is known for its quirky branding and, you know, leveraging on what's going on right now. But what's interesting is you've received ESG ratings of A and A minus from MSCI and CDP respectively. Are these important? How do these external validations influence your overall strategy? Is this effective when it comes to marketing and brand? Well, one crash we're up to an A with CDP now as well, so some further upgrades there. I don't think they're important from a marketing perspective that much. I think they're important for investors. As opposed to maybe us changing the way we do things internally. For me, they're really about transparency in what we're doing. And that's been a theme across Europe. So we're required to report under the corporate sustainability, right, reporting directive, and that requires our financial orders to review and audit our sustainability data. So I think it gives confidence, I think it gives some credibility to our sustainability strategy and that it's signed to line. I think the key questions that I get are around from investors now are around emission intensity trajectory, what are self adoption rates? These are the type of things that investors are really focused on. I don't think the customer base is as focused on that right now. We had offered certain things on the booking platform, like all setting, and it really didn't get the traction that you think it might have received. So for me, the work that we do in terms of our ESG rating engagements is for investors to have a real transparent and credible view of what we're doing to really set ourselves apart from the competition and all the good things that we're doing right, the investors would expect of some of these other investors. Fair enough. So it's much more of a investor relation, than a marketing brand. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sorry, you're just going back to on marketing as well. I mean, we've a one-man marketing team in our CEO. So I mean, that's all the support that that's needed there. It's not something that something else has needed on the sustainable side. Fair enough. Looking towards 2030, what regulatory or market developments do you think will have the biggest impact on your ability to achieve or exceed that 12 and 5% of the market? Yeah. Look, I think there's a difficult road to get there. And as I said, I think that while the market is long right now at present, I think it could turn short for south. So the key drivers for me will be the pace of new South production capacity in Europe. Partly linked to that is just feed stock a bit availability, and then the competition from all their markets outside of Europe and where we operate from in order to be able to achieve that. Not to hammer home on this point too much, but I think the extension of SAF ETS lenses through feeds will also be key, because if Europe enhanced this, if they allowed all SAF purchases to be direct reduction in ETS exposure, I think it could really scale SAF towards 2030. I mean, we'll continue to prepare through our those engagements with the SAF suppliers. As I say, I talked to 40 fuel suppliers and given moments, and then the regulators to remove barriers to what we're seeing in terms of barriers to its SAF production. It's very enough. I think that's really good. Is there anything that Rhinare is doing that's unique and innovative in sustainability that we've actually not spoken about? I mean, it all comes down to fuel being the biggest cost for NERLINE. With the low cost model, fuel is actually a higher percentage of your cost. We do so many things to try and just reduce our cost burden to where we do self-handling. We do self-handling across Dublin, across all Spain, all the Portugal standards, so key locations. We are moving more and more to electric ground equipment. I think that's a key part of the ecosystem. It's maybe not entirely unique, but we're talking and looking at emissions across
across the entire spectrum. And then in terms of how we get to the cockpit, I let's have iPads, there's no big flight logs going on. It's all electric. What we're talking about reducing costs, we get up to date weather patterns to help make sure that we're taking the optimum amount of fuel at any given point in time. And flight plans are refreshed frequently. So we know exactly that we're taking the optimum amount of fuel. We're looking at it even moving to get-- moving to an E-match-based solution. So we're able to monitor how much the suppliers are actually putting on board on a more granular level to make sure that it's completely optimized. I mean, there's lots of innovative things that we'll continue to look at to reduce our fuel consumption. Fantastic. The final part of this interview is the rapid fire on in which we get to know you, Steven, a bit more personally. I'm sure you've heard this on the podcast. Previously from other guests. So we'll start with something simple. What's your favorite airport? A Dublin airport. OK. Easy? Why is that? Look, good memories of going through there. Expectation of holidays. Yeah, good fun. OK. But do you know the fun fact? Dublin Airport is the only airport in the world where it's own brand of whiskey, if I'm not wrong, which cannot get both anywhere else. Yeah, you can get it at a duty free. They don't have it anywhere else. Very good. I'm not going to try it. Well, that might be something for Ryanair passengers. You never go. Favorite movie? The Departus. Good choice, which choice? Love it. Favorite city? New York? I used to live that way. Love us? Yeah. OK. Favorite airline? That's not Ryanair. So I don't fly too often outside of our network. I mean, we've just got such good choice. I mean, there's 3,500 different routes. So look, I'm going to have to pass on that one. Good play there. Do you have a favorite book? Yeah. golf is not a game of perfect by Dr. Bob. I need it. I read it often. Is it about golf? It is about golf. You must be an avid golf for them. That's my next question. What do you mean, a pre-guy? Yeah, golfing and acting as a taxi driver. But yeah, golfing. Acting as a taxi driver for your kids, I'm supposing. Yes, at the weekends. I hear you. I was like, is he moonlighting as a new world driver here? He's not that bad in writer. What is something you'd like to learn Steven? I think a new language. Yeah. Okay. Do you know or speak Gailet? I do. Yeah. And I can. I think I need to guess French or German for when I have to engage with regulators on trying to build out on stuff and enhance self-production. So I think that could be a good one to get. What is the best advice you've received? Don't pull the ladder up with you. Nice. I love it. Okay, that's deep. That's deep. And finally, if we are speaking one year from now and we are popping champagne, what are we celebrating? I think we'll be Rhinare taking as much soft as anyone globally in 2026. Wow. Love it. I love the ambition. Let's track the numbers and I think you're on your way on this journey. Congratulations for coming this far and all of your technically in-depth answers. I really appreciate it. I sense a pre-sage with Hermes Chishank. Good to talk. Thank you for listening to this episode of Sustainability in the Air. Aviation is one of the hardest to decabinize industries yet there are multiple parts to get to net zero. Awareness is key to a green future. So please give us your support to help our sustainable aviation insights reach a wider audience. You can do this by sharing this episode on your network on LinkedIn, Twitter or even WhatsApp or perhaps you might consider leaving a review on Apple podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen to this episode. We can start a conversation with us by writing to us at
[email protected]. And for more content on sustainable aviation please visit our website green.simpliflying.com and join the movement. Sustainability in the Air is an original podcast by Simpliflying. The show is produced by Uri Toth in Slovakia. Mark Singer is our director of sustainability who leads research for each interviewee out of Greenwich UK. Shobadi Pau is our supervising editor based out of Mumbai and Singapore. The articles are written by Ayushi Badola in the Haradun in India and Mirahal in Montreal Quebec. Creative design is led by Leahya Esteve in Montreal. Laiber Dremain is the project director for the show based out of Valencia, Spain. Special thanks to Wendy Sim in Singapore and I'm Shoshan Piggum, the CEO of Simpliflying and your host. Please feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn.
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