White Desert Signs Long-Term Offtake Agreement With Sasol For Sustainable Aviation Fuel at AEW 2026

Global integrated chemicals and energy company Sasol and luxury Antarctic expedition company White Desert, announced a partnership at African Energy Week 2026 in Cape Town, in which White Desert signed a long-term offtake agreement as the first off taker of Sasol’s Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) that Sasol will produce commercially in South Africa at its Natref facility in Sasolburg, South Africa.

What makes the SAF unique is that it is currently being produced from spent South African cooking oil at the Natref facility.

The SAF produced has been certified safe for use within White Desert’s Airbus A340-600 which it flies to Antarctica.

Building on its SAF capability at Natref, Elri Volsteedt, Head of Technical at Sasol said the company will be using its proprietary Fischer-Tropsch technology at its Coal-to-Liquids facility in Secunda, in South Africa to also produce SAF using bio-sludge and bio-mass as a feedstock.

According to Chester Foster, Executive for Antarctic Operations at White Desert, the expedition company is effectively buying as much of Sasol’s SAF as possible, reducing the carbon impact that its operations have on the planet. “By burning this fuel, we have a net-zero carbon impact,” Foster noted.

“Sasol is the first company in Africa to be able to produce and provide SAF to the aviation industry,” said Volsteedt.

The parties believe the agreement represents an important milestone for both Southern Africa and the aviation industry. With locally produced SAF now becoming a commercially viable option, this partnership highlights Africa's readiness to support the aviation sector's decarbonisation ambitions.

As countries around the world continue to introduce SAF mandates and accelerate the shift towards lower-carbon fuels, this announcement demonstrates the practical steps being taken in South Africa to enable this transition.