Jet fuel mixed with vegetable oil is a good way to make air travel greener, but it is only part of the solution.
The air travel industry is doing lots of things to become sustainable.
These efforts include changes to aircraft design, improved jet engines, new routes between airports, solar powered planes and engines powered by hydrogen and vegetable oil.
Lets call these efforts 'eco-aviation technology' and hope that one day they form an air travel industry that is in balance with nature.
The information below describes new eco-aviation technology as they are developed. |
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 The Manned Cloud.
Not fast, but eco.
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First, here are the latest news stories about aviation and environment from Greenair Online.
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Sept 08: Algae based Jet Fuel First
Solazyme Produces World's First Algal-Based Jet Fuel - Fuel Passes All Tested Specifications including the Most Critical ASTM D1655 Specifications.
It has passed the biggest hurdles needed to successfully develop a commercial and military jet fuel fully consistent with existing engines and infrastructure” as stated in the SwRI report. Download the press release |
Sept 08: Air NZ 'Aspires' to cut emissions AIR New Zealand has once again raised the environmental bar for the airline industry after completing what was dubbed "one prefect flight" from Auckland to San Francisco last Friday. The flight - NZ8 - in a world first, used optimised procedures and flight routings tocut fuel burn and emission significantly. That saving translated into 12 tonnes less CO2.
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Oct 08: Greener By Design Conference
Greener by Design has since its inception wrestled with the environmental challenges facing aviation, seeking to offer technical and policy solutions through its reports and strategic work– and holding conferences that ask the key questions and explore the key areas of science,
technology or policy. This year we ask some key questions. Come and find out the answers.
Download the brochure
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Sept 08: Solar plane flies into the night
A lightweight solar-powered plane has smashed the official world record for the longest-duration unmanned flight. UK defence firm Qinetiq, which built the Zephyr unmanned aerial vehicle, said it flew for 54 hours during tests.
The researchers believe it is the first time a solar-powered craft has flown under its own power through two nights. Download the report |
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Jun 08: A Plane That Flies for Five Years The highest-endurance aircraft currently flying is Northrop Grumman's Global Hawk UAV, which can stay aloft for up to 40 hours. Darpa which, to its credit, is never short on outlandish ideas now wants to beat that endurance record by more than 1,000 times. The goal of Darpa's recently launched Vulture Program is to build an atmospheric satellite that can stay aloft for five years at a time with little or no maintenance. |
Apr 08: Fly the Eco-Friendly Skies
An excellent overview of the technological challenges to reducing the environmental impact of air travel. Provided by Popular Science magazine.
Popular Science, February 2008, p. 40
Download the report
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Feb 08: Virgin Airline in first biofuel flight
The first flight by a commercial airline flight to be powered partly by biofuel has taken place. A Virgin Atlantic jumbo jet has flown between London's Heathrow and Amsterdam using fuel derived from a mixture of Brazilian babassu nuts and coconuts.
Download the report
Richard Branson explains his bet on Biofuels |
Jan 08: Green Skies at Mach 5
Modern air travel is a marvel. It is also a source of endless delay, annoyance and planet-killing greenhouse gases. A proposed hydrogen-powered hypersonic airliner could change all that. The plane, pictured right, is Reaction Engines' A2 Concept, a Mach-5 (3,400mph) craft for 300 passengers funded in part by the European Union's Long-Term Advanced Propulsion Concepts and Technologies project (Lapcat). Lapcat wants an airliner that can fly from Brussels to Sydney in less than four hours. Download the report
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Jan 08: Fuel-less Gravity Powered Flight
This concept plane alternates between heavier than air to lighter than air. It will float upwards, boosted with compressed air fans, than fall towards the ground assisted by gravity. An interesting concept? The video describes the manner in which it is projected to work. Download the report |
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May 07: The A6 Greenliner
The prospect of 'Green flying' has come a step closer thanks to the work of a group of the brightest and best aeronautics students from the world-famous Department of Aerospace Engineering at Cranfield University. The students had to develop a concept design for a 380-seat 'green' airliner that would be more environmentally friendly than existing aircraft and had potential for further development, as part of their MSc in Aerospace Vehicle Design. News report. |
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The Manned Cloud. A flying hotel designed by Jean-Marie Massaud.
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