Petrobras Turns to Cardano to Track Green Claims on Jet Fuel and Renewable Diesel

What happened

Brazil's state-controlled energy company Petrobras has built two research-stage blockchain applications on the Cardano network to record and verify environmental claims tied to its sustainable aviation fuel and renewable diesel products. The tools were developed via a partnership between Petrobras, the Swiss non-profit Cardano Foundation, and Rio de Janeiro's Pontifical Catholic University (PUC-Rio), with the goal of making fuel emissions and lifecycle data easier to audit for airlines and passengers. The first tool focuses on sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), a lower-carbon jet fuel that works with existing aircraft and airport infrastructure. It uses a Book-and-Claim model that splits the fuel's environmental benefit from the physical fuel, so the benefit can be credited to an airline, company or traveler even if the fuel was produced or used elsewhere. Each SAF attribute is issued on Cardano as a standardized token called CS-SAF, with metadata aligned to CORSIA, the international aviation carbon offsetting scheme. The tokens can be minted, transferred, and retired to prevent the same environmental benefit from being counted more than once. Passengers can enter their departure and arrival airports to calculate the matching CS-SAF amount, then receive a certificate linking their route, distance, and fuel allocation to the original fuel certificate. The second tool targets Petrobras' Diesel R renewable diesel brand, and logs checkpoints as the fuel is produced, transported, and used to build a single, traceable lifecycle record. This record is designed to support Scope 3 reporting, which covers indirect emissions across a company's value chain and often relies on data held by suppliers and logistics firms. The announcement did not include a timeline for commercial rollout of either tool.

Why it matters

The tools address a growing need for verifiable green fuel claims as airlines and travelers face increasing pressure to reduce carbon emissions. Current sustainable fuel certification often relies on paper-based records that are hard to trace across complex, global supply chains. Using a public blockchain to record fuel attributes creates an immutable, auditable trail of where environmental benefits originated, who received them, and whether they have already been used for claims. As Rafael Fraga, LATAM business development lead at the Cardano Foundation, said, public blockchain can embed trust into emissions reporting systems by design, supporting broader energy transition efforts. The work builds on an existing relationship between Petrobras and the Cardano Foundation that dates back to December 2023, when the foundation launched blockchain education workshops for Petrobras staff through the company's internal university program, which serves more than 40,000 employees. A formal research collaboration with PUC-Rio's Ledger Labs focusing on renewable fuel blockchain use cases was announced in April 2025, with Petrobras as an industry partner.

What is still unclear

• No public data is available on airline customers, fuel volumes processed, or the number of retired CS-SAF tokens, which would indicate the real-world usage scale of the platform.
• The tools are in the research stage only, and there is no confirmation that regulators will accept Cardano-based records for official CORSIA emissions reporting.

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