Copenflop fall-out – what next?
On 16/02/2010, in Environment - Without hot air, by cleo
The Copenhagen environment conference was supposed to bring solutions to the problems nearer. The conference was a complete flop, certainly in
respect of aviation. Of course, trusting anything this serious to politicians is a bad idea to begin with, but this is the world we live in. We must trust them to get it right every now and again. Copenhagen was not one of their better days… But what will aviation be doing now?
Luckily, we are long past the initial arguments saying that aviation’s part in harmful emissions was so small, it was not even worth talking abut. The contribution is still very small but avoiding talking about it gets few friends for any industry… Aviation has built itself a reputation of environmental consciousness and as a source of innovative solutions, both of which were set as examples to other industries just before the Copenflop. That none of those ideas were used or even considered by the conference is not aviation’s fault….
Is the industry ready for this?
On 19/01/2010, in Environment - Without hot air, by steve
The northern hemisphere has just gone through its snowiest January days in 40 years and polar temperatures reached as far South as Orlando in Florida. Sure, this is not abnormal some may say… but what if we do not have to wait forty years for the next episode?
An Air France flight en-route from Brazil to France encountered so severe turbulence that they issued a Mayday call but subsequently they completed the flight without incident. As we all know, AF447 was less fortunate.
Over the past 18 month or so, there were several incidents where unexpected severe turbulence caused passenger injuries…
And now the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) says, as reported in Aviation Week, that “climate change could be contributing to more extreme weather conditions at high altitudes that have not previously been encountered by aircraft”.
Make no mistake, although the current investigation of the crash of AF447 talks a lot about the problems with pitot tubes prone to freezing, there is a much more sinister implication here. Pilots are trained to handle situations where pitot tube data is lost or is unreliable… You cannot however train pilots to fly an aircraft with a wing or stabilizer gone. This is the point… who says extreme weather can only come in the form of extreme cold and not also as extreme turbulence?
Energy, the environment and hot air
On 01/01/2010, in Environment - Without hot air, by phil
The book. Free!
Protecting the environment and using energy sustainably are both of great importance for Europe and the world. The SESAR Programme for ATM has, as one of its business objectives; “Reducing the environmental impact per flight by 10%”. Other European initiatives such as ACARE and Clean Sky aim at improving the efficiency and reducing the environmental impact of aircraft and engines. And Europe as a whole has set itself some very tough targets for reducing CO2. But what technologies should we be developing and what is physically possible? Far too much hot air is being talked by politicians and companies with vested interests who either don’t know the basic numbers, or who wish to become rich by selling their own pet projects.
Aviation is often victimised as one of the main offenders. Yet without aviation how well would our modern economy function? Transport is essential to the way we live, but what technologies should we use – biofuel, hydrogen, electricity or continue to burn hydrocarbons? We also need energy to heat our homes, our commercial buildings and to generate electricity, but should we use nuclear, solar, gas, clean coal, hydro-electric, wind, tide or wave? And in what proportion should these be used if we wish to live sustainably and as comfortably as we do now?
Environment. The Copenflop – Is aviation better off now?
On 27/12/2009, in Environment - Without hot air, by cleo
We all remember how seriously aviation had been preparing for the UN environmental conference held earlier this month in Copenhagen. Led by IATA, the aviation industry arrived with concrete proposals and plans which were seen by several non-aviation experts as templates suitable also for other industries.
Once the conference kicked off, aviation experts must have felt like adults thrown into a kindergarten with a very poor teacher at the helm. Kids shouting all over the place, getting into fights, leaving the playroom when not granted their favorite toys… Those who ventured outside to escape the worst of the circus fared no better. There was another kind of kindergarten out there, albeit with destruction and tear-gas thrown in to increase the fun.
Of course the kids inside were the same politicians who are convinced that electric cars charged from a public utility produce virtually no emissions and also who had promised to shutter nuclear reactors while having no idea how to replace their generating capacity. It was no surprise to see them come together after having brandished the environmental flag at home and then fail to agree on the time of day, let alone actual environmental action.
When blue means green
On 27/11/2009, in Environment - Without hot air, by steve
The KLM 747 shown below circled The Netherlands for an hour on 23 November with one of its four engines running on a 50 % mix of biokerosene. The new fuel aptly tagged “sustainable kerosene” was manufactured from the camelina plant by a biotechnology company in Seattle, USA.
KLM said that this was the first ever flight in Europe powered partly by sustainable kerosene.
Some 40 people, including politicians, airline officials and journalists, were on board.
KLM stressed that its interest in sustainable kerosene is conditional on the availability of solutions that do not jeopardize the food supply, forests or water resources.
This flight was definitely an important first step towards cleaner and sustainable air transport. The general availability of sustainable kerosene is one aspect that will determine how quickly companies adopt the new fuel.
I have only one nagging question… what color will the contrail be behind a fully bio aero engine? (SMILE)
Bio is in…
On 17/09/2009, in Environment - Without hot air, by steve
One of the, perhaps not unexpected, results of the current world economic crisis is the explosive growth of corporate social responsibility. Part of this is in response to the growing demand of the general population to move from unchecked consumerism and predatory capitalism to a more sustainable and socially more equitable form of market economy. Protecting the environment while working on this change is a natural.
Corporations are responding because they have discovered that a more socially responsible attitude brings not only new sources of investment but also increased customer loyalty. Of course this is nothing new. Benjamin Franklin was on the same track when he was popularizing the idea of doing well by doing good… and that was quite some years before Lehman Brothers et al.
For some reason, air transportation has been a popular target of environmentalists and politicians alike who tend to attack the industry for being environmental morons who are also socially irresponsible. Since it is not really realistic (even for environmentalists and politicians) to suggest that airlines offer bicycles to their customers instead of aircraft seats, the elegant and simple solution of capping air traffic growth is being put forward instead by some.
Perpetuum mobile…
On 29/08/2009, in Environment - Without hot air, by steve
Great news! I have invented a truly working perpetual motion machine. The perpetuum mobile is now reality! What? You do not believe it? Never mind. You are then one of those people who will not buy a Hybrid drive car and who also do not stand in awe in front of those aberrations ruining the countryside, wind turbines claiming to be THE solution for renewable energy.
But there are others, including governments, who believe in both, what is more, subsidize them to make the show even grander… Alongside Hybrid drive cars and wind turbines, my perpetual motion machine has a real chance. But what does this have to do with air traffic management?
