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Clean energy & green infrastructure

What the harvest leaves behind becomes the fuel for flight.

Sankla Renewables is developing a ₹15,000 crore Sustainable Aviation Fuel manufacturing project at Chalisgaon in Jalgaon district, Maharashtra — converting agricultural residue from India's farm belt into aviation-grade fuel, under a memorandum of understanding with the Government of Maharashtra signed at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

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Commitment
₹15,000 crorePhased capital deployment
Counterparty
Government of MaharashtraMemorandum of understanding
Site
ChalisgaonJalgaon district, Maharashtra
Signed at
WEF DavosSwitzerland, January 2026
Commissioning
Phased to 2029Risk-managed scale-up

The thesis

Aviation cannot electrify. It has to change what it burns.

Flight is one of the hardest sectors to decarbonise. Batteries cannot carry a wide-body aircraft across an ocean, and the global fleet in service today will still be flying well into the 2040s. The only lever that works at scale, on existing aircraft and existing airport infrastructure, is the fuel itself — a drop-in liquid that meets aviation specification but is made from something other than crude oil.

That is what Sustainable Aviation Fuel is. Demand for it is no longer speculative: it is being written into international rules, national blending targets and airline procurement contracts. India has set indicative targets for SAF blending in jet fuel for international flights from 2027, and the International Civil Aviation Organization's CORSIA framework gives airlines a direct incentive to buy certified volumes.

India has the feedstock the world is short of

The binding constraint on global SAF supply is not demand or refining capacity. It is sustainable feedstock. India generates hundreds of millions of tonnes of crop residue every year — much of it burned in the field for want of a buyer, at real cost to air quality and soil health.

Maharashtra's Khandesh belt sits on four of those residue streams at once: sugarcane bagasse, cotton stalks, soybean husk and pigeon pea waste. Sankla Renewables was formed to convert that residue into a certified aviation fuel, and to pay for it at the farm gate under long-term contracts.

A tonne of crop residue is either a disposal problem or a feedstock. The difference is whether someone has built a plant to buy it.

Sankla Renewables — platform statement

From field to flight

Five steps from a burned field to a certified fuel.

The project is being engineered around internationally certified conversion technologies. Pathway selection is under evaluation with licensors ahead of a final investment decision.

  1. 01

    Collect

    Residue is aggregated from farms across the Khandesh belt through long-term procurement arrangements and farmer producer organisations.

  2. 02

    Prepare

    Material is dried, sized and densified to a consistent specification so the conversion units run on a stable, storable feed.

  3. 03

    Convert

    Prepared biomass is converted into an energy-dense intermediate — syngas or alcohol — using an internationally certified licensed process.

  4. 04

    Synthesise

    The intermediate is catalytically built into liquid hydrocarbon chains and upgraded to jet-range specification.

  5. 05

    Certify & lift

    Fuel is tested to aviation specification, blended with conventional jet fuel and delivered into the airport supply chain.

Feedstock

Four residue streams, one procurement system.

Nothing edible is diverted. The project is designed around what the harvest leaves behind, aggregated inside a defined catchment to keep transport emissions and cost low.

Sugarcane bagasse

The fibrous residue left after cane is crushed — abundant, already aggregated at mill gates.

Sugar mill catchment

Cotton stalks

Woody stems left standing after picking, today largely uprooted and burned in the field.

Khandesh cotton belt

Soybean husk

Processing residue from one of Maharashtra's largest oilseed crops, available year-round.

Oilseed processing

Pigeon pea residue

Stalk and pod waste from tur cultivation, collected after the rabi harvest window.

Pulse crop residue

Residue is procured through long-term arrangements with farmers, farmer producer organisations and processing units across the Jalgaon–Khandesh belt, creating a formal, priced market where one does not exist today.

The site

Chalisgaon, Jalgaon district.

Chosen for what a manufacturing asset of this size actually needs: residue within economic haulage distance, a railway junction on the Mumbai–Bhusawal trunk line, national highway access toward Nashik and Dhule, and a workforce catchment that does not have to be imported.

  • CatchmentFour residue streams

    Cane, cotton, soybean and pulse residue inside the surrounding agricultural districts.

  • LogisticsRail and highway

    Chalisgaon Junction on Central Railway; road corridors toward Nashik, Dhule and Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar.

  • DeliveryPhased to 2029

    Capital deployed in stages so each phase proves out before the next is committed.

Schematic locator for the Chalisgaon site A schematic showing Chalisgaon at the centre with approximate bearings and road distances to Jalgaon, Dhule, Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Nashik and Mumbai. Not to scale. JALGAON · 60 KM DHULE · 60 KM SAMBHAJINAGAR · 105 KM NASHIK · 130 KM MUMBAI · 330 KM CHALISGAON N SCHEMATIC — BEARINGS INDICATIVE, NOT TO SCALE
  • Project site
  • Regional centres
  • Feedstock catchment

Impact

The plant is the point. So is everything around it.

An asset of this size changes a district's economy. The project is being designed so that change is deliberate rather than incidental.

  • Farm incomeA price for residue

    Long-term procurement contracts turn a disposal cost into a recurring, contracted income line for farming households.

  • Air qualityLess field burning

    Every tonne bought is a tonne that does not need to be burned to clear a field for the next sowing.

  • Employment3,000+ roles

    Direct and indirect employment across construction, operations, logistics and the residue supply chain.

  • EnergyImport substitution

    Domestically produced jet fuel reduces exposure to imported crude and hard-currency fuel bills.

Standards we are building toward

Fuel spec

ASTM D7566

Aviation turbine fuel containing synthesised hydrocarbons — the specification a SAF pathway must be certified against.

Emissions

ICAO CORSIA

The international scheme under which eligible fuels are certified and claimed by airlines.

Sustainability

ISCC / RSB

Third-party certification of feedstock traceability and lifecycle emissions across the chain of custody.

Operations

ISO 14001 & 45001

Environmental and occupational health and safety management systems for the operating asset.

Certification is a design objective for the project and will be pursued through accredited bodies as engineering, technology selection and commissioning progress.

Partnerships

Build this with us.

We are in active conversation with technology licensors, airline and trader offtakers, EPC contractors, development finance institutions and farmer producer organisations. If your work touches any part of this chain, we would like to hear from you.