IATA Launches CADO to Power Global SAF Registry and Accelerate Aviation Decarbonisation

By Maria Kalamatas | March 25, 2025 | The Logistic News

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) is making major strides in aviation’s journey toward decarbonisation with the upcoming launch of its Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) Registry—backed by the newly established Civil Aviation Decarbonization Organization (CADO).

CADO, a not-for-profit entity headquartered in Montreal, Canada, has been created to manage the global SAF Registry upon its release. IATA is the founding member and will continue to provide technical and operational support, while CADO functions independently to ensure transparency and trust across the industry.

“CADO will turbo-charge the imminent launch of the IATA-developed SAF Registry,” said Marie Owens Thomsen, IATA’s Senior Vice President of Sustainability and Chief Economist. “Its mandate is to manage the Registry as a separate entity from IATA with an open and global approach that supports the scrutiny needed to build trust among all stakeholders.”

CADO membership is open to a wide range of stakeholders, including organisations within the SAF value chain, government agencies, and associations with a direct or indirect role in sustainable fuel development and deployment.

The SAF Registry is designed to be a global, standardized platform to record SAF transactions, track environmental benefits across the supply chain, and support both regulatory compliance and voluntary carbon reduction claims. By linking airlines with SAF producers and suppliers—regardless of geographic location—it addresses one of the industry’s most pressing challenges: the limited and geographically scattered availability of SAF.

The Registry will also benefit corporate airline customers by offering access to verified in-sector emissions reductions. This enables businesses to co-finance SAF procurement and support broader industry decarbonisation goals while aligning with their own sustainability targets.

Participation in the SAF Registry will be free of charge until April 2027, after which it will transition to a cost-recovery model to ensure sustainable operations.

Willie Walsh, IATA’s Director General, emphasized the importance of this infrastructure: “The SAF Registry is a critical piece of market infrastructure that is indispensable in building a global, transparent, and liquid market for SAF. The structure we are putting in place with CADO is an important step in moving decarbonisation forward.”

He added, “The industry’s commitment to build the Registry and establish CADO to manage it should inspire governments, fossil fuel producers, and investors to engage in the SAF market with commensurate vigor. Ramping up SAF production is the common goal.”

With CADO at the helm, IATA’s SAF Registry is positioned to become a cornerstone of sustainable aviation, helping unlock the scale and confidence needed for long-term industry transformation.

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