How to increase passenger volumes in the civil aviation sector while drastically reducing aircraft greenhouse gas emissions? Below are the main elements of this issue:
– What does air traffic represent?
The airline sector transported 4.5 billion passengers in 2019, which meant a production of 900 million tons of CO2, that is, around 2% of global emissions. It is estimated that, by 2050, the number of passengers will double, which, in principle, would also mean doubling CO2 emissions.
This forecast generated environmental mobilization, with campaigns such as “Flygskam” (“shame to take a plane”), in Sweden, in 2018.
Between 2009 and 2019, airlines improved their energy efficiency by 21.4%, according to the International Air Transport Association (IATA). This does not prevent, however, the sector’s emissions from continuing to increase.
– What are the commitments?
In early October, Iata committed to having “zero net emissions” of CO2 by 2050. The initial goal was simply to divide them by two.
At the state level, the European Union wants to reduce its emissions by 55% by 2030 compared to 1990. This includes the airline sector. The United States, in turn, wants to reduce emissions from commercial aviation by 20%, compared to the current trajectory.
– What are the instruments to achieve this goal?
Europeans hope that technological and infrastructure advances – whether with new materials, more fuel-efficient engines, better air traffic management, hydrogen-based planes, or a greater role for electricity – will help halve emissions.
Iata believes, however, that only 14% of the goal will be achieved.
To achieve “zero net emissions”, the sector’s plans go through carbon offset mechanisms (such as planting trees). The proposal is criticized by environmental protection NGOs, as it would only displace the problem – not solve it.
– What is the role of sustainable fuels?
“The only miracle solution to decarbonising aviation is sustainable fuels,” says Brian Moran, head of sustainable development at Boeing.
Iata estimates that two-thirds of the decarbonization effort should fall on sustainable aviation fuels (CAS), produced from cooking oil, algae, wood residues, or “biomass” products.
The European Commission plans to establish a requirement to incorporate 2% CAS into aviation kerosene by 2025; 5% in 2030; and 63% in 2050. Boeing and Airbus predict that their planes will be able to fly with 100% CAS by the end of this decade.
Today, CAS cost four times more than kerosene and, what is more delicate, it is not easy to obtain. They represent less than 0.1% of the 360 billion liters of fuel used by aviation in 2019.
A whole new sector must emerge, to increase production and bring prices down.
The EU believes that this could be achieved through new taxes on kerosene for domestic flights, while the United States proposes tax incentives.
– It’s possible?
Airbus CEO Guillaume Faury believes that technological innovations in planes and, in particular, in the hydrogen plane, will be ready, “but it is not just about creating the plane, but about regulatory agencies in the energy sector.”
Biomass is, however, a limited resource.
As Jo Dardenne of the European Federation for Transport and Environment (T&E) explains to AFP: “We believe that by 2050, advanced waste-based biofuels will cover 11% of the needs of the airline industry.
The sector is therefore betting on future synthetic fuels, or electrofuels, made with hydrogen produced with renewable electricity and with CO2 captured in the atmosphere.
Producing electrofuels that add up to 10% of the current consumption of aviation kerosene is equivalent, however, to the total electricity production of Spain and France together, explains the director of the International Energy Agency (IEA), Timur Gül.
“The technologies that one wants to develop to reduce emissions in the air sector will be extremely energetic”, adds Dardenne, for whom there is no other remedy than to “change the paradigm”, that is, to fly less.
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