Petrobras, Brazil's state-controlled energy company, is testing the Cardano blockchain to track sustainable aviation fuel benefits and prevent double-counting. The Cardano Foundation announced on Sept. 30 that an ongoing research and development collaboration has delivered applications for sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) and Diesel R, which is Petrobras' renewable fuel brand.
The sustainable aviation fuel project addresses challenges that occur when the buyer of a fuel's environmental benefit differs from the actual buyer or user of the fuel. Utilizing a Book-and-Claim model, the platform allows airlines, companies, or passengers to receive environmental benefits even if the SAF is produced or utilized elsewhere.
Petrobras developed the SAF platform alongside PUC-Rio University's Ledger Labs and the Cardano Foundation. According to a case study from the Foundation, the system represents SAF environmental attributes as standardized CS-SAF tokens on Cardano. These tokens can be created, transferred, checked, and retired. The retirement process prevents the same attribute from being claimed multiple times, while the digital record traces each allocation back to the original fuel certificate.
Travelers can enter their departure and destination airports to calculate a CS-SAF allocation, receiving a certificate that details their route, distance, and allocation. The associated claims remain linked to the original SAF certificate, carrying metadata aligned with CORSIA, the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation.
Expanding Applications to Diesel R
Beyond aviation, the Diesel R project developed with PUC-Rio proposes specific checkpoints across production, transportation, and use. The initiative aims to establish a continuous fuel-lifecycle record designed to support Scope 3 reporting, which covers indirect emissions across a company's broader value chain. This architecture connects information maintained by suppliers and logistics providers to offer a traceable supply-chain history for emissions reporting.
While the SAF platform demonstrates how Cardano can record the allocation and retirement of environmental benefits, commercial usage remains unquantified, as disclosures from the Foundation do not provide transaction volumes or revenue figures.
