My Big Idea: Sustainable jet fuel maker OXCCU

‍Hi Andrew! What does OXCCU do?

OXCCU, a spin-out company from the University of Oxford, is developing novel catalysts and reactor designs to convert waste carbon and hydrogen into sustainable fuels, chemicals and plastics. Our mission is to enable future generations the continued use of hydrocarbon fuels but without their climate impact.

How did the idea for setting up OXCCU come about?

As a chemistry graduate from Oxford University I had always been fascinated with what fuels the wheels of modern society, which is essentially oil, gas, and energy. And with the accelerating challenge of climate change I wanted to see if technology could help us find alternatives to fossil fuels while sustaining the same standard of living.

After six years at BP and four years in VC, an unexpected breakthrough in 2020 set things in motion. A team of researchers at the University of Oxford, including Professor Peter Edwards, Dr Tiancun Xiao and Dr Benzhen Yao (who later became our academic founders) cracked a single-step process that could convert CO₂ and green hydrogen directly into e-fuels. When powered by renewable energy and combined with biogenic or captured point source carbon dioxide, this process can reduce lifecycle emissions by up to 90 percent, essentially converting emissions into fuel.The technology is also applicable to convert other waste carbon gas streams such as gasified wood waste and steam reformed biogas. 

This breakthrough was the catalyst for OXCCU. Alongside my co-founder Dr Jane Jin, the company was established in 2021 with the mission to develop the world’s lowest cost, lowest emission pathways to make both jet fuel and chemicals from waste carbon — allowing people to continue flying and using hydrocarbon products without the climate impact.

Why does the market need it?

The world needs to reach net zero emissions within the next 30 years if we are to limit the impacts of climate change, which means drastically cutting down the use of fossil fuels. 

While some sectors, such as power, are already on this path, not all sectors are easy to decarbonise. For instance the energy density requirement for long-distance aviation transport fuels go far beyond current batteries, but it is equally unrealistic to expect people to simply stop flying. The solution has to be sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).

The core problem is that currently, sustainable aviation fuels remain too expensive to compete with fossil-based jet fuel. Alternatives are estimated to cost up to four times more, largely because many existing processes for converting carbon dioxide into fuel require two or more complex and capital-intensive steps. That’s where we come in.

Our breakthrough OXFUEL technology directly converts CO2 and/CO and hydrogen into hydrocarbons in a single step, using a patented iron catalyst. By cutting out costly intermediate steps, this process significantly reduces capital and operating costs, making SAF more competitive with fossil-based Jet fuel and accelerating adoption across the industry.

Where is the business today?

In Summer 2024, we successfully launched OX1, our first demonstration plant, at London Oxford Airport, producing 1.2 litres of SAF daily and operating for 800 hours. This milestone validated our unique catalyst and reactor design, proving we can efficiently convert CO2 directly into jet fuel-range hydrocarbons. The results have exceeded expectations, with conversion increasing by over 40% and significantly higher SAF selectivity than anticipated. 

Our 2024 techno-economic analysis also showed a 50% reduction in capital costs and a 25% reduction in fuel costs for e-SAF using our technology, which will further help widespread adoption of SAF.

Securing funding to support our rapid growth has been crucial. We raised £18 million in Series A funding in 2023 and were awarded a £3.1 million government grant earlier this year to accelerate aviation sector decarbonisation. This financial backing has enabled us to expand our team from 10 to 21 employees and advance our technology development and engineering capability.

Most recently, we’re incredibly proud to have secured another £20.75 million in our latest round of Series B funding. This will allow OXCCU to build and operate the OX2 plant (set to be fully operational in 2026) as well as prepare the initial project details for a future commercial plant and continue our lab-based research programme. 

What makes you stand out from your competitors?

The key differentiator is our patented one-step process to convert both CO2 and CO to long chain hydrocarbons, significantly reducing both capex and opex when compared to conventional multi-step processes used by other SAF companies. Other companies also typically rely on sources such as vegetable oil, used cooking oil or ethanol, but these rely on crops and are limited due to land use.

OXCCU’s technology also offers more feedstock flexibility, converting CO2 and green hydrogen from a variety of sources, providing a scalable solution with minimal land use impact. 

What is the secret to making the business work? 

Success for us comes down to having a clear mission backed by world-class science and offering a solution to an urgent problem which is genuinely scalable. 

Securing investment in the climate tech space isn’t easy. The industry depends on supportive policy, such as ReFuelEU, and close collaboration with airlines and government. That’s why we’ve structured our leadership with both academic expertise from Oxford and practical commercial experience from the energy and investment sectors; so we lead in both the science and the market.

From day one, we’ve focused on proving not just that the technology works, but that it can scale economically. Our aim is to bring down the cost of producing sustainable aviation fuel from around five to ten times the price of fossil jet fuel today to roughly double. That’s what will make it viable at scale and truly accelerate the transition to lower-carbon flight.

How do you market the company?

Credibility is key to our reputation. In an emerging industry like SAF, it’s easy to over promise — but we take the opposite approach. We’re transparent about where we are today, set realistic milestones, and consistently deliver against them. That discipline builds confidence with our investors, partners, and airlines.

We've also learned just how important it is to communicate the commercial viability of our technology, not just the science behind it.  Investors and industry players need a clear path to market adoption. We are careful not to oversell and remain humble whilst also building the trust and momentum needed to scale real climate impact.

What is the future vision?

In the next five years we're focused on scaling up production and demonstrating that OXFUEL can be produced at commercial scale. Our goal is to have a plant producing 10,000 tonnes a year of SAF using OXCCU technology before 2030. In the long term, we see applications beyond aviation in chemicals and plastics, broadening the impact of our technology on global decarbonisation efforts.

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