Aviation Heavyweights to Develop Alternative Fuel
May 19, 2008
A group of airline industry companies, including Airbus, Honeywell, and JetBlue have formed a partnership to develop technology for alternative fuels for planes. If successful, this would significantly reduce their carbon footprint, which is becoming especially important in the fight against global warming as aviation becomes a bigger slice of global carbon emissions.
The hope is that the fuel will be manufactured using algae and vegetable oils and could represent 30% of airline fuel needs by 2030. It is great news that the airline industry is starting to take their carbon footprint more seriously, but the goals are timelines they have outlined are not the most ambitious. The auto industry will likely using mostly electric cars by 2030, but planes are only changing 30% of their fuel needs in an already rapidly growing industry?
One of the partners in the project is UOP, a gas and chemical company. UOP has already developed technology to convert natural gasses and oils to military jet fuel, which could play a significant role in this project if altered slightly.
Many sceptics see this announcement, and others like it, from the airline industry, as a convenient way to restate the same message about cutting their carbon footprint without bringing any significant new technological developments to the table.
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