Sustainability Criteria for Green Fuels and Basic Materials from Renewable Energy
Copyright: PtX Lab Lausitz/iStock
PtX Lab Study | 09/2025 | Topic: Sustainability | 138 Pages
The transition to a greenhouse gas-neutral and competitive economy requires the rapid expansion of renewable energies and the replacement of fossil fuels with sustainable alternatives. Electricity-based, green fuels and raw materials – known as renewable fuels of non-biological origin (RFNBO) – are indispensable in this process.
The necessary market ramp-up to produce the required quantities of RFNBO requires clear sustainability criteria that create trust and thus enable investment. Pragmatic and robust sustainability criteria create trust, enabling diversified domestic projects and partnerships for imports.
This creates a broad market that prevents unilateral dependencies and uncertainties. Effective and practicable sustainability criteria for electricity-based green fuels and basic materials thus become an important resilience factor in building a climate-neutral and competitive economy.
The study Sustainability Criteria for Green Fuels and Basic Materials from Renewable Energy — A Comprehensive Approach for a Rapid and Secure Market Ramp-Up develops a dynamic criteria system that assesses the sustainability of RFNBO based on ten key aspects – from electricity procurement and greenhouse gas reduction to social standards and resource and water use.
It proposes staggered, differentiated criteria for the various phases of market ramp-up, based on the S-curve model, and provides recommendations for action for an effective and resilient sustainability strategy.
The aim is to maintain a balance between a rapid and, at the same time, robustly sustainable market ramp-up of RFNBO.
Bibliographic data
- Publication: Sustainability Criteria for Green Fuels and Basic Materials from Renewable Energy — A Comprehensive Approach for a Rapid and Secure Market Ramp-Up
- Publication date: September 2025 (The German-language version is expected to be published in calendar week 40.)
- Publisher: PtX Lab Lausitz – Think and Do Tank for Fuels and Basic Materials from Green Hydrogen, Calauer Straße 70, 03048 Cottbus
- Authors: Lukas Horndasch, Nils Fuchs, Jessica Nagamichi, Felix Schmermer, Dr Lorenzo Cremonese, Anja Paumen, Dr Sarah Bernhardt, Anita Demuth, Dr Harry Demuth
- Suggested citation: PtX Lab Lausitz (2025): Sustainability Criteria for Green Fuels and Basic Materials from Renewable Energy — A Comprehensive Approach for a Rapid and Secure Market Ramp-Up
About the study
The PtX Lab Study Sustainability Criteria for Green Fuels and Basic Materials from Renewable Energy — A Comprehensive Approach for a Rapid and Secure Market Ramp-Up builds on an earlier PtX Lab study, Development of PtX Sustainability Standards and Indicators, from 2022. This study proposed a set of sustainability criteria for PtL jet fuel based on the SDGs, planetary boundaries and legal requirements.
Sustainable criteria development for green hydrogen derivatives
The criteria development follows three guiding principles:
- minimising ecological and social risks (do no harm),
- distributing opportunities and added value fairly (benefit sharing) and
- accelerating the transformation through practicable requirements.
The desired regulatory framework should be ecologically sustainable and compatible with industrial policy in order to create a globally fair and climate-friendly market for green hydrogen derivatives.
The criteria developed provide a sound basis for debates on robust and pragmatic sustainability standards. They are intended to support funding instruments, international harmonisation and the upcoming review of EU rules for RFNBO.
Contact
Anita Demuth
Deputy Head / Head of Section PtX Mobility
+49 152 28 400 735
Write E-Mail
more information
