Ready for takeoff

While the media and environmental activists have tended to focus on the auto industry over the past year, the air travel industry has been quietly evaluating ways to improve fuel efficiency and reduce emissions. Airlines can only raise ticket prices so high to compensate for rising fuel costs without losing customers, and the industry’s reputation as a climate change villain is an increasing threat to profits. Even with air travel back to pre-9/11levels, the airlines are facing several incentives to change their environmental performance or be faced again with bankruptcy. And with several airlines now testing various types and blends of biofuels, a shift in air travel could spell renewed profits for the biofuel industry as well.

Although businesses everywhere continue to pay a premium for travel in a global business world, despite advances in conferencing and networking technologies [see "Bytes not flights," April 2008], many are balking at the price, according to several recent surveys, and many corporate travel managers intend to cut the number and cost of trips in 2008. The average domestic business trip in 2008 is projected to cost 6 percent more than the average 2007 trip, according to American Express Business Travel Advisory Services (NYSE: AXP). The company predicts a 5 to 10 percent increase for international business tickets. Meetings-related travel is also growing, according to the NBTA, leading to higher overall travel costs for corporations. Despite industry predictions, there are signs that travel growth could slow without changes: Eight percent of the 215 corporate travel buyers surveyed in late 2007 by NBTA said they were beginning to curtail non-essential travel to mitigate higher costs, and 16 percent said they would cut business-class travel in 2008.

Cost pressure to reduce business travel could be good news for environmental activists who have voiced concerns about the high levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) and nitrogen oxide emissions from air travel. Planes produce 19 times the greenhouse gas emissions of trains and 190 times that of ships, and the impact of emissions released at cruising altitude is 2.7 times greater than those released at ground level, according to the nonprofit Friends of the Earth. Air travel currently accounts for about 3.5 percent of the human contribution to global warming according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), but the Official Airline Guide, an air travel industry research and publishing organization, reported in March 2007 that the number of flights scheduled in October 2007 was 3 percent higher than in the same month in 2006, and was the highest October figure on record for more than five years. According to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), emissions from the sector could increase 60 percent by 2025, and the number of passengers traveling by air could reach the 1 billion mark by 2015.

In Europe, super-cheap intra-European flights from airlines such as easyJet and Ryanair have come under fire for contributing to a sudden spike in emissions. While easyJet has responded by launching a redesign of its jets that the company claims will improve fuel efficiency while reducing CO2 emissions by 50 percent, and offering consumers the option of purchasing carbon offsets, such voluntary offset programs could be short lived [see “Offsets take off,” SI, April 2008 ]. At the start of the year, European airlines agreed to a cap- and-trade system for greenhouse gas emissions associated with intra-European flights beginning in 2011; international airlines would be expected to join in 2012. The proposal has been aggressively opposed by the U.S. government, which claims it is in violation of international aviation and trade law, and by airlines worldwide, which say the cost of joining the scheme would cripple them. The E.U. proposal was also taken up by several agencies and five U.S. states, including California, in a late December lawsuit filed against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The claimants argue the agency has a responsibility to use its power to regulate air travel emissions.

Airplane pilots (or their hi-tech counterparts) can use strategic flight patterns to reduce fuel use on the go.

Approaching efficiency
Efficiency is the first step airlines are taking, in the form of updated planes and new approaches to flying. A flight technique called “continuous descent approach,” pioneered by United Parcel Services (UPS), has been embraced both by the FAA and commercial airlines such as Virgin Atlantic. The current norm for descents entails a step-down approach: a series of steep drops followed by flat, level flight. Continuous descent takes aircraft gradually from flying altitude to the ground in a steady approach, with engines at a near-idle, which burns far less fuel. UPS currently uses continuous descent for a dozen of its flights into Louisville, Ken., and reports a 34 percent reduction in nitrogen oxide emissions below 3,000 feet, a 30 percent reduction in aircraft noise within 15miles of the airport, and an average fuel savings of 50gallons per flight.

The FAA now has implemented continuous descent for several routes at airports in Louisville, Ky., Phoenix, Salt Lake City and Atlanta, and one easterly route into Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), which applies to 250flights, or 27 percent of the airport’s air traffic. Two additional routes are set to switch to the new technique by the end of the year, which means half the planes using the airport will be coasting in on arrival, according to the agency. In December 2007, Scandinavian Airlines completed the first trans-Atlantic continuous descent flight.

The FAA has also been working for the past few years on devising new and more efficient routes between U.S. airports. “We’re implementing new procedures that will allow pilots to fly more direct—and more precise— routes, which means less fuel burned and a smaller noise footprint on the ground,” Ian Gregor, a spokesman for FAA, explains. While more airlines champion the continuous descent approach as an easy way to reduce emissions, save fuel and reduce noise, UPS cautions it could also lead to more flights, since airliners can be spaced more precisely and land at closer intervals; such an increase in traffic could make the industry a greater polluter and consumer of fuel overall.

Getting a grip on ground control
While not in favor of airlines joining the E.U. carbon trading scheme, the federal government did sign an agreement in late 2007 to cut emissions from aircraft by improving air traffic control systems. To that end, the FAA is beginning to build a new air traffic control system, which uses GPS technology rather than ground radar, Gregor says.

The system, called Automatic Dependence Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B), is another technology UPS has been using to increase its air freight efficiency for years. The company uses a version of ADS-B at its Louisville hubs to calculate the most efficient routes for its planes; UPS estimates the technology enables nearly a 15 percent increase in flight efficiency, saving $1 million in fuel annually. UPS has also installed ADS-B on all of its 757 and 767 aircraft, helping the company to proactively manage aircraft departure queues, which it claims reduces fuel use and emissions.

Terrance Scott, environmental communications specialist for Boeing (NYSE: BA), backs up this claim. “Improvements in the air traffic management system have the potential to provide near-term efficiency improvements on the range of 12 to 16 percent,” he says. “You can design the most efficient aircraft imaginable, but efficiency gains can be mitigated by an inefficient operating environment that can lead to delays, missed flights and holding patterns.”

The FAA has been researching and testing GPS systems for the past seven years, installing them on test planes in Alaska. The agency is now moving forward with installing the systems throughout the rest of the country, but it is expected to take another 12 years and nearly $15 billion before the 800systems necessary to cover the whole country are installed.

Boeing’s Dreamliner 787 claims fuel-efficiency gains of 20 percent or more, but production delays have slowed its time to market.

Boeing vs. Airbus
As the U.S. airline industry began rebounding in 2005, the majority of airlines brought older, less- efficient planes back into service, rather than purchasing new, more efficient planes. According to the Energy Information Administration, the increase in air travel coupled with the reintroduction of less efficient aircraft resulted in a 4.1 percent increase in demand for kerosene jet fuel in 2005, totaling 1.64million barrels per day.

The two major plane manufacturers, Airbus and Boeing, are both working to address the efficiency needs of their airline customers with two competing products, the Airbus 380 and Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner. The Airbus 380, which was delivered to its first commercial customer in October 2007, is extremely quiet on takeoff and landing and claims a 20  to 40 percent increase in fuel efficiency over currently available commercial jets, depending on the number of passengers onboard.

Boeing makes similar fuel efficiency claims for the Dreamliner, but also provides a longer range and reduces the materials, waste and carbon emissions associated with manufacturing the plane [see “Planes, trains and automobiles,” SI, February 2006].

Through its use of a one-piece fuselage, Boeing has eliminated 1,500 aluminum sheets and 40,000 to 50,000 fasteners from the Dreamliner. Although only the Airbus 380 is currently in operation (Dreamliners will be in service as of late 2008 and early 2009), airlines appear to prefer the Dreamliner. Boeing has received 857 orders to date; compared with 189 Airbus 380 orders, the launch is the most successful in Boeing’s history. The Dreamliner, according to Scott, is Boeing’s way of preparing for whatever the future brings. “Our job is to build the most efficient aircraft possible and we’re doing that,” he says. “Coupled with investment in new R&D technologies such as alternative fuels and aircraft recycling, we’re positioned to add additional value to the market regardless of which way things head.”

Introducing biojets
The cost of jet fuel has risen dramatically in the past five years and now represents 30 percent of most airline budgets, according to Green Chip Stocks managing editor Jeff Siegel. The FAA listed 2006 as the first time in history that fuel became the single largest component of U.S. airline operating costs. The agency launched the Commercial Aviation Alternative Fuels Initiative in January 2008to research “secure, sustainable fuel sources,” which the agency says are essential to the continued prosperity of the airline industry. The initiative brings together government agencies, commercial airlines, airplane manufacturers and biofuel companies to collect and share data on alternative jet fuels.

Meanwhile, the commercial aviation industry has been conducting its own research. Boeing partnered with Virgin America, General Electric (NYSE: GE), and Seattle-based Imperium Renewables in 2007 to develop a biofuel blend that the partners tested on a London to Amsterdam flight in late February 2008. A 20 percent biofuel blend, produced by Seattle-based Imperium Renewables from babassu and coconut oils powered the test flight.

While a partnership with the air travel industry could be a life raft for Imperium Renewables, which postponed its IPO and lost its CEO in 2007, the choice of fuel came as a surprise after a U.K. Department of Transport document indicating that the flight would use 20 percent algae-based fuel was leaked to the press in early February.

The leak followed a string of interviews in which Boeing executives touted the potential of algae-based fuels and dismissed so-called “first- generation” biofuels. Babassu and coconut oil are both considered first-generation feedstocks, and the choice to use them in the biofuel test flight angered some environmental activists, who deemed the flight a mere publicity stunt.

Virgin was the first major airline to launch a biofuel-powered test flight.

Criticism of the flight team for not using algae- based fuels may be unfair. Although the potential of algae-based fuels has been publicized for some time now, industry experts and even algae-based fuel companies say the commercialization of the fuel is at least another five years off [see “Algae arms race,” SI, April 2007].

Several biofuel companies are testing algae as a feedstock—including Imperium, in partnership with San Francisco-based Solazyme, which recently received financial backing from Chevron (NYSE: CVX). A Boeing official told Flight magazine the first flight was a proof of concept and algae-based fuels would be considered for future test flights. The company is planning a second biofuel test flight later this year with Air New Zealand.

Boeing seems to be getting the lion’s share of press about its alternative fuel partnerships, but its primary competitor, Airbus, is also testing alternative fuels. Three weeks before Boeing and Virgin’s test flight, Airbus tested a synthetic fuel processed from gas (gas-to-liquid fuel, or GTL) on a three-hour flight from Airbus’s U.K. headquarters in Filton, to Toulouse, France, in partnership with Shell (NYSE: RDS) and Qatar Airways. Although derived from fossil fuels, Airbus calls GTL a viable short-term alternative due to the fact that it burns more cleanly and with little to no sulfur. Airbus says it will evaluate other alternative fuels as well, including second- generation biofuels as they become available.

By all accounts it will be several weeks before the research gained from early alternative fuel test flights is fully analyzed, and several years before biofuels derived from any feedstock are viable for the commercial air travel industry. In the meantime, new flight methods and an updated air traffic control system could provide short-term solutions, and as new more efficient planes take to the air, fuel costs and emissions should be reduced. It seems unlikely, however, that the cost of travel will decrease any time soon.