Category: Inflation_Act_2022_Transportation Legislations_MN PATA_Inflation_Reduction_Act_2022_Related TRANSPORTATION_AVIATION_CN

As aviation companies develop the first hydrogen-powered jets and electric regional aircraft, a more immediate way to curb the industry’s climate pollution is to burn ​“sustainable aviation fuel.” Made from waste materials such as used cooking oil, landfill gas and forest residue, the fuels can be blended with fossil jet fuel and used in existing engines. The problem is that today’s sustainable supplies amount to a tiny drop: well below 1 percent of global jet fuel demand.

United Airlines Holdings Inc. UAL 1.32%▲ has paid a $10 million deposit for 100 electric flying taxis, a sign that the airline is growing more confident in the nascent technology.
United and a regional airline it partners with last year invested in Archer Aviation Inc. ACHR -4.75%▼ and struck a preliminary agreement to buy up to 200 of the flying taxis that the San Francisco Bay Area-based company is developing. Other airlines and leasing companies have announced their own investments in flying-taxi startups and preliminary orders. But the aircraft haven’t yet been approved by regulators to fly passengers, and customers generally haven’t had to put down cash.

As climate change edges from crisis to emergency, the aviation sector looks set to miss its 2050 goal of net-zero emissions. In the five years preceding the pandemic, the top four U.S. airlines—American, Delta, Southwest, and United—saw a 15 percent increase in the use of jet fuel. Despite continual improvements in engine efficiencies, that number is projected to keep rising.

It’s no secret that travelling by aeroplane is the least environmentally friendly method. Emissions per mile travelled are significantly less efficient than any other form of transport; however, the average person flying on a packed passenger flight somewhat mitigates this impact.

JET A-1, A straw-colored, kerosene-based fuel used in most big airplanes, is a difficult substance to replace. It’s packed with energy; per unit of weight, at least 60 times as much as the lithium-ion batteries used to propel electric cars. It’s also terrible for the climate. So as the aviation industry has gradually climbed aboard global pledges to get rid of carbon emissions, it has mostly promised to make up for its damage elsewhere—through offsets that might involve planting trees, restoring wetlands, or paying people to preserve ecosystems that otherwise would have been razed. But according to a growing body of research, those efforts leave something out: Most of the planet-warming effects of flying aren’t from carbon dioxide.

Record temperatures at the Farnborough Airshow this week have ratcheted up pressure on global aviation to shrink airplane emissions and turn a raft of potential solutions – many of which are yet to be proven – into reality.

Better batteries, lighter-weight materials and other innovations — plus huge capital investments — are opening the door to novel and lower-emissions transportation solutions like flying taxis, drones and seagliders.

One day late in 2023 an almost-empty commercial airliner is expected to lift off on a trans-Atlantic flight between Britain and the United States that Prime Minister Boris Johnson casts as a once in a generation breakthrough for aviation and the battle against climate change.

Sergey Brin turned internet search into one of the world’s most valuable businesses more than two decades ago. Now he intends to improve a technology which had its heyday long before he was born. Brin and his team of engineers’ plan is to do this by reinventing a much older, if improved technology. A new generation of airships – the lighter-than-air craft that don’t need conventional airports – will be built in a corner of Ohio which played a unique part in the history of aviation. What’s more, if built they will be housed in one of America’s most iconic structures, the Goodyear Airdock in Akron.

Imagine avoiding that soul-crushing, hourlong slog — say from Santa Monica to downtown L.A. on a Tuesday morning. Instead, you hail a high-tech cab that will hop over the gridlock and get you there in nine minutes.