Qantas gives green light to energy efficient tri-generation power plants at three Sydney facilities
Fri 26 Feb 2010 - Two power plants will be constructed by energy company GridX to serve Qantas' Sydney Jet Base, catering centre and domestic terminal, representing the largest commercial tri-generation - cooling, heating and electricity - project so far undertaken in Australia. By capturing heat that would otherwise be lost, tri-generation can achieve, through the use of natural gas, energy efficiencies of around 80 percent compared with an average of 35 percent for a conventional supply of energy from the coal-powered grid. The airline says it is part of a sustainability package that was fundamental to its long-term business strategy. Read more ...
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CO2 emissions from scheduled airline flights within the scope of the Aviation EU ETS fell by around 7 percent in 2009
Wed 24 Feb 2010 - Data compiled by consultants RDC Aviation show that CO2 emissions from flights by scheduled airlines that fall within the scope of the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS) fell by 6.85 percent in 2009 compared to the previous year. All but five of the top 30 airlines with the highest CO2 outputs showed a decline in emissions, with Lufthansa overtaking British Airways as Europe's highest airline emitter of aviation CO2. As would be expected, CO2 emissions from aircraft also declined at European airports, by 7.12 percent, with heaviest falls at Stockholm-Arlanda and Dublin. Annual figures from the Association of European Airlines, ACI Europe and Eurocontrol confirm steep declines in passengers, cargo and flights in 2009. Read more ...
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Airlines should do more to improve their dismal waste recycling policies, says US consumer watchdog
Wed 24 Feb 2010 - With a typical passenger generating 1.3 pounds (0.6kg) of waste per flight, US airlines create over 880 million pounds (400,000 tonnes) of waste annually, of which 75 percent could be recycled but only 20 percent actually takes place. This is the main finding of a report, 'What goes up must go down: The sorry state of recycling in the airline industry', published by Green America's consumer watchdog website ResponsibleShopper.org. The report ranks 11 major airlines on their recycling efforts and offers suggestions the industry can take to improve recycling overall, as well as action airline passengers can adopt to improve recycling. It rates Delta, Virgin and Southwest as doing the best job, with United and US Airways at the bottom of the list. Read more ...
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ICAO environmental committee recommends more stringent NOx standards on new aircraft from 2014
Mon 22 Feb 2010 - The triennial meeting of ICAO's Committee on Aviation Environmental Protection (CAEP 8) has recommended more stringent Nitrogen Oxides (NOx) emission standards of up to 15 percent on large engines and 5-15 percent on small engines certified after 31 December 2013. ICAO said that CAEP was also committed to a timetable for the development of a new CO2 standard by the time of the next CAEP meeting in 2013 (CAEP 9), which would apply - if agreed by Member States - to new aircraft engines from around 2016/7. Pressure for an international CO2 standard has been growing, particularly from the US, but the metrics are still unclear and a work programme, including on noise emissions, is now due to start within CAEP. Read more ...
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North American survey of eco-travellers finds two-thirds could not name a single environmentally friendly airline
Thu 18 Feb 2010 - An extensive survey of 1,736 green travellers, mainly from the US and Canada, shows there are significant opportunities - or challenges - to airlines in establishing an environmentally friendly brand image to this growing market segment. Over 65 percent of respondents could not name a single airline that presented itself as environmentally friendly. With a 4 percent response, Southwest Airlines was the 'winner', receiving almost twice as many mentions as other airlines. Carbon offset programmes also fared badly in the survey with the largest group of respondents not knowing enough about them to form an opinion. Read more ...
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Noise action plans submitted by UK airports dismissed as a sham by environmental campaigners
Wed 17 Feb 2010 - A report by campaign group the Aviation Environment Federation (AEF) concludes that Noise Action Plans submitted by all 22 UK airports affected by UK and EU legislation on environmental noise will fail to tackle impacts on local communities. AEF says that the minimum requirements of the EU Environmental Noise Directive - which was passed in 2002 (2002/49/EC) and enacted in the UK in 2006 - have not been met by the NAPs submitted to the relevant authorities in England, Northern Ireland and Scotland. The legislation is designed to help protect communities against excessive noise from airports, railways, roads and built-up areas. Read more ...
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Marketing high-speed rail as an environmental solution on short-haul routes is wrong, argues study
Wed 17 Feb 2010 - Switching passengers from air to high-speed rail on short-haul routes is a growing mantra but a new study concludes that the principal benefits of high-speed rail are time savings and additional capacity, not a reduction in greenhouse gases. Traffic diverted to high-speed rail from other forms of transport over a route of 500km would save around 90,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions a year, assuming 10 million single journeys. However, the construction emissions alone for a line of this length may amount to several million tonnes of CO2. Therefore, says the study, in cases where anticipated journey volumes are low it is not only difficult to justify investment on economic grounds, it may also be hard to defend a project for environmental reasons as it would take too long for traffic to offset the emissions caused by building the line. Read more ...
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Biofuels are essential to reducing EU ETS carbon costs and meeting carbon-neutral growth goals, says report
Tue 16 Feb 2010 - Although not commercially viable yet, the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS) offers a strong financial, as well as environmental, incentive for the adoption of jet biofuels, says a new report by EQ2. Based on industry assumptions of 15 percent and 30 percent consumption of biofuels in 2020 and 2030 respectively, they could contribute to potential savings for airlines involved in the EU ETS of $2.01 billion in 2020 and $5.84 billion in 2030 on the purchase of carbon credits. Based on the current EU ETS carbon price for 2012 of 15 euros and the 2009 average jet fuel price of $1.69 per gallon, every gallon of jet fuel burned would incur carbon costs of an additional $0.21, equivalent to a premium of 12.4 percent. Read more ...
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Additional carbon taxes may need to be introduced to constrain air travel demand, says UK's climate advisor
Mon 15 Feb 2010 – David Kennedy, CEO of the UK's Committee on Climate Change (CCC), has said biofuels and fuel efficiency improvements could allow a 60 percent increase in UK passengers up to 2050 but demand would most likely reach around 115 percent without further measures such as a carbon tax and restrictions on airport expansion and slots. The Government's climate advisor forecasted biofuels would only contribute 10 percent towards an anticipated overall 35 percent industry fuel intensity improvement by 2050 and said biofuels should not be regarded as a 'silver bullet'. UK policy is for aviation carbon emissions to be no more in 2050 than they were in 2005 - around 37 million tonnes. Read more ...
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British Airways partners with Solena to build Europe's first sustainable biojet fuel production facility
Mon 15 Feb 2010 - British Airways is set to become the first major European airline to use commercial-scale sustainable jet biofuel in its daily operations. In partnership with Washington, DC-based Solena Group, the airline anticipates using 16 million US gallons of biofuels produced annually from a new plant to be sited in east London. The $280 million self-contained plant, which is due to open in 2014, will convert 500,000 tonnes of waste per year when fully operational into enough jet fuel to meet BA's entire needs, and more, at London City Airport. Under the Letter of Intent, Solena will construct the plant and BA has agreed to take the entire output. BA CEO Willie Walsh said the partnership would help the airline realize its goal of reducing net carbon emissions by 50 percent by 2050. Read more ...
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Air traffic control improvements are key to cutting aviation emissions in the short term, finds new Oxford study
Wed 10 Feb 2010 - Biofuels could reduce pollution and better technology boost efficiency but neither will have the global impact that improved flight management could achieve, says a new report by the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment at the University of Oxford. Dr Chris Carey, the Smith School's aviation expert, says the most obvious target for improving efficiency in aviation is engines - the source of emissions - but major technological innovations are a massive financial risk and new, more efficient aircraft are slow to reach the market. However, in a best-case scenario, which foresees major advances in aircraft technology, a high take-up in jet biofuels and a fully integrated global air traffic management system, aviation emissions could be cut by up to 95 percent by 2050. Read more ...
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Eurocontrol to conduct feasibility study of integrating GHG emissions assessments into air traffic flow management
Tue 9 Feb 2010 - French-based Egis Avia has been awarded a contract by Eurocontrol to study the integration of a greenhouse gas emissions assessment feature for the optimization of Air Traffic Flow and Capacity Management (ATFCM) network operations provided by Eurocontrol's Central Flow Management Unit (CFMU). The CFMU acts as an interface between the airspace users - who file the flight plans - the airports and the air navigation service providers (ANSPs) that provide Air Traffic Control (ATC) and other related services. The objective of the study is to raise the CFMU's role in allowing all stakeholders to understand the impact of their decisions on the environment, particularly emissions. Read more ...
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Munich Airport's first sustainability report outlines plans to achieve carbon-neutral growth by 2020
Tue 9 Feb 2010 - FMG, the Munich Airport operating company, has published its first-ever sustainability report, which lays out its goals and measures to reach a carbon-neutral status by 2020. Entitled 'Perspectives', the 110-page report documents FMG's concept for a sustainable business policy based on balancing ecological, economic and social objectives. In order to achieve both carbon-neutral growth and handle the expected increase in traffic, the airport will have to reduce carbon emissions by over a third, and FMG has developed numerous energy-saving measures to meet the challenge. Meanwhile, Frankfurt Airport has just started construction of its first carbon neutral building, a new fire station. Read more ...
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Aerospace giant EADS enters into algae jet fuel research collaboration with Singapore's ICES
Thu 4 Feb 2010 - EADS, parent company of Airbus, has signed a 12-month collaboration agreement with Singapore's Institute of Chemical and Engineering Sciences (ICES) to assess the potential for microalgae as a renewable source of fuel for aircraft and to investigate the conversion of algae oil for use as a jet fuel. As microalgae are much more efficient than plants at converting solar energy and carbon dioxide into fixed biomass, there is significant interest across multiple sectors in their long-term potential as an energy source. ICES and EADS say that the rapid growth of microalgae - doubling in biomass in as little as a few hours - means that nearly 90,000 litres of oil per hectare can be produced annually. Read more ...
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Singapore Airlines completes first ASPIRE multi-sector green flight and saves over 33 tonnes of CO2 emissions
Wed 3 Feb 2010 - The Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore (CAAS) has revealed that the multi-sector demonstration flight from Los Angeles to Singapore via Tokyo conducted by Singapore Airlines saved 10,686kg of fuel and cut carbon emissions by 33,769kg compared to normal practice, as well as achieving a reduction in flight time of 33 minutes. The arrival of the flight on Monday coincided with CAAS formally joining the Asia and Pacific Initiative to Reduce Emissions (ASPIRE) that aims to accelerate the development, implementation and harmonization of air traffic management procedures, technologies and best practices on key routes in the region. With the Singapore Airshow also starting this week, IATA announced that in 2009 intra-Asia-Pacific travel had eclipsed the number of travellers in North America as the world's largest aviation market. Read more ...
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Emissions from UK-based international aviation continued on downward path in 2008, reports DECC
Tue 2 Feb 2010 - Final 2008 results for UK greenhouse gas emissions released by the Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC) show a fall in emissions from international aviation fuel from 35.8 million tonnes to 34.4 million tonnes carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e), a decline of 3.7 percent. However, between 1990 and 2008 the level of these emissions has more than doubled and do not include a greenhouse effect caused by high altitude aviation. Between 2007 and 2008, emissions from domestic aviation decreased by an even higher 5.0 percent. Between 1990 and 2008, emissions from this sector increased by 62.5 percent. Read more ...
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