Pioneering sustainable aviation fuel producer LanzaJet received the Renewable Fuels Association’s 2026 Industry Award at the National Ethanol Conference in Orlando this week. Last year the company became the world’s first to produce jet fuel from ethanol at a commercial-scale facility.
The LanzaJet Freedom Pines Fuels facility in Soperton, Georgia, has an annual production capacity of 10 million gallons of alcohol-to-jet SAF, and it remains the only biorefinery currently producing ethanol-based SAF in the United States. LanzaJet CEO Jimmy Samartzis was at the National Ethanol Conference to receive the award; Meg Witty, vice president of corporate and government affairs, represents the company on RFA’s board of directors.
LanzaJet is supported by a broad range of investors and funders, including Airbus, All Nippon Airways, British Airways, LanzaTech, Microsoft’s Climate Innovation Fund, Mitsui & Co., Shell, Southwest Airlines, the U.S. Department of Energy, and the UK Department for Transport. The company also has been recognized for its impact by TIME, Fortune, MIT, Reuters, S&P Global, and others.
“We’ve made history by, for the first time ever, creating jet fuel that meets the same standards as fossil-based jet fuel with something that’s not oil,” said Samartzis in an interview at NEC. “Ethanol is just an absolutely wonderful molecule that enables us to do that and do that efficiently and to meet the specs. So the opportunity for the United States to stand out as a leader, not only with domestic production, but also as an exporter of ethanol to meet the demands globally is a significant one. And I’d like to believe that we as a company in our technology is a beacon of hope for our farmers and the ethanol producers in our country.”
Learn more about LanzaJet in this interview.
NEC26 interview - Jimmy Samartzis, LanzaJet (3:04)