Land conversion to energy crops for sustainable aviation fuel production reduces greenhouse gas emissions in the United States

Energy crops will be critical for scaling up production of Sustainable Aviation Fuel in the United States and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Here we examine the economic incentives for the extent and type of land conversion needed to scale up fuel production from a mix of cellulosic feedstocks and quantify its greenhouse gas intensity. We show that even with the availability of marginal non-cropland, there will be incentives for converting cropland to produce energy crops as the price of sustainable aviation fuel increases. But contrary to expectations, we find that scaling up fuel production by converting more cropland and more non-cropland from existing uses to energy crops lowers its net greenhouse gas intensity, due to high soil carbon sequestration rate of energy crops, even after considering land use change emissions.The potential savings in emissions are larger than the foregone soil carbon accumulation benefits from keeping that land in current uses. In the US, the cropland and non-cropland conversion from existing uses to cellulosic feedstocks for sustainable aviation fuels reduces the net greenhouse gas emissions intensity, according to a framework that combines economic, biochemical, and feedstock-specific process engineering models.