Amazon has made a strategic investment in GranBio, a biotechnology company developing biomass conversion technology that turns forestry residues and construction waste into sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), renewable diesel and renewable gasoline.
GranBio's process breaks down woody biomass — including leftover forestry branches, crop stalks, and discarded construction materials such as pallets and plywood — to release the carbon locked in plant fibre, then synthesises it into fuel molecules chemically identical to those in conventional jet fuel, diesel and petrol. A byproduct of the process generates heat for the facility itself, cutting the plant's reliance on external energy. The resulting fuels are designed as drop-in replacements, compatible with existing engines and fuel infrastructure, making them usable in aviation and long-haul trucking without modification.
Much of the feedstock GranBio targets — forestry offcuts and construction debris — currently has little productive use in the US, often ending up in landfill or left as wildfire fuel load. The company's research and development site in Thomaston, Georgia, is where this conversion process is being developed and tested.
The investment lands at a moment when SAF supply is falling short of industry ambitions. According to SkyNRG's 2026 Outlook, projected global SAF demand for 2030 has been revised down to 12.8 million tonnes, from 15.5 million tonnes a year earlier — equivalent to 3.6% of global jet fuel demand, down from an earlier estimate of 4.5%. Much of that shortfall reflects growing competition for traditional SAF feedstocks like used cooking oil and animal fats, which are increasingly constrained, pushing developers toward advanced pathways built on non-food lignocellulosic biomass instead.
Geography is also shaping the response: Europe has leaned on demand mandates and risk-sharing mechanisms, the US has relied more heavily on financial incentives, and parts of Asia are scaling production through direct policy support. GranBio's waste-biomass route sits squarely within that push to diversify feedstocks beyond the increasingly competitive fats-and-oils supply chain.
Rather than building entirely new sites, GranBio plans to expand SAF production capacity over the next decade by converting shuttered pulp and paper mills across the US into advanced biorefineries — repurposing dormant industrial infrastructure and, the company says, restoring skilled manufacturing jobs in the regions where those mills once operated.
"Working with Amazon on this project brings us closer to proving that sustainable aviation fuel made from forest and construction waste can be a real, scalable solution for decarbonizing aviation," said Kim Nelson, GranBio's chief technology officer.
Andreas Marschner, Amazon's Vice President of Worldwide Operations Sustainability, framed the investment as an attempt to help create supply where none yet exists at scale: lower-carbon aviation fuel remains scarce, and Amazon's backing is intended to help demonstrate demand for a solution that, if it works, could become available across the wider industry.
For Amazon, the deal forms part of its broader effort to test and develop technologies capable of cutting carbon emissions across its global operations — spanning transportation, buildings and packaging — in support of its Climate Pledge commitment to reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2040.
Amazon backs GranBio in biomass-to-fuel push
