Unlocking Indonesia's Biofuel Leadership: POME-based SAF Development Pathways, Barriers, and Strategic Imperatives for Global Aviation Decarbonization
Loso Judijanto
ABSTRACT
The aviation sector is recognized as one of the most challenging industries to decarbonize, prompting increasing global interest in Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) derived from low-carbon and waste-based feedstocks. In Indonesia, Palm Oil Mill Effluent (POME) represents a significant industrial by-product with potential strategic relevance for SAF development within a circular economy framework. This study aims to systematically synthesize and evaluate existing scholarly evidence on POME-based SAF development in Indonesia, focusing on technological pathways, deployment barriers, and strategic imperatives for scaling in support of global aviation decarbonization. This research employs a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) approach. Data were collected exclusively from peer- eviewed journal articles indexed in the Scopus database. An initial search using the keywords “sustainable aviation fuel” AND “biofuel” yielded 671 articles, which were refined through targeted Boolean queries, publication year filtering (2019–2025), and Open Access/Open Archive screening, resulting in 25 eligible studies. Data analysis was conducted using thematic synthesis to integrate technological, environmental, economic, infrastructural, and policy dimensions. The results indicate that anaerobic digestion-based pathways combined with Fischer–Tropsch and Alcohol-to-Jet conversion dominate POME-based SAF research, with reported lifecycle greenhouse gas reductions of 60–85%. While feedstock availability is abundant, scalability is constrained by capital intensity, infrastructural dispersion, and limited SAF-specific policy support. In conclusion, POME-based SAF development in Indonesia is technically and environmentally viable but requires coordinated policy frameworks and infrastructure integration. Future research should prioritize integrated techno-economic and lifecycle assessments to strengthen evidence-based policy formulation.
