Show above are 11,000 contrails, equal to the number of commercial flights in the US every eight hours. Around 85,000 commercial flights take off around the world each day (see the rest below), and this number is predicted to double by 2050. A single flight across the Atlantic can guzzle about 60,000 litres of kerosene generating around 140 tonnes of carbon dioxide and over 370 tons of greenhouse gases in total.