Airlines Trial Low-Emission Commercial Flights

A seemingly-regular American Airlines Boeing 767 airliner flight from Paris to Miami scheduled for Thursday June 11th will mark a major moment in low-emission commercial air travel.  This is because not only will it be carried out using satellites as a directional aid, but the aircraft’s departure, climb and descent will take place in line with environmentally-friendly, fuel consumption lowering and CO2-emission reducing methods.

The Boeing’s flight represents the latest component of a wider drive within the airline industry called NextGen.  Once implemented in full, supporters of NextGen see it ushering in an age of quicker, more direct and less polluting airliner flights.

During the June 11th American Airlines flight, GPS will almost entirely replace traditional radio communications. 

It was Miami Int. Airport that, two months ago, had NextGen equipment installed, a “first” for a major US hub.  Such technology could ultimately take over from older radar systems in full, although the FAA has stressed that its roll-out will be progressive and, thus, the switchover could take decades.

AIRE - Atlantic Interoperability Initiative to Reduce Emissions

American Airlines highlighted how the June 11th Boeing 767 flight was a strand of an initiative known as AIRE – Atlantic Interoperability Initiative to Reduce Emissions – which sees the EC (European Commission), the FAA and a number of prominent airlines collaborating to accelerate the introduction of technologies and methods aimed at lowering airliner emissions.  

Aviation Carbon Footprint

Taking the June 11th flight as an example of AIRE, the aircraft will start off by transiting from terminal to runway on a single engine (the Boeing 767 is a twin-engined airliner), before effectively being allowed to “queue-jump” and take-off ahead of other waiting airliners.  So, already, its journey from ground-to-air will have been conducted with minimum impact on the environment.  Its descent into landing, meanwhile, will occur as a single motion, rather than in stages with platforms of level flight in between.  In this way, fuel consumption will be lowered, emissions of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere reduced and the aviation carbon footprint minimised. 

As well as American Airlines, Air France will also be carrying out a similar flight in the next few days. Referring to both, Miami-based FAA official Russ Moreno commented:  “They will be flown without any kind of delay to see what is the maximum benefit that can be achieved from the tailored arrival concept.”

The only element of the flight where GPS will not be used will be during the landing phase, not because of system limitations, but just because authorities still favour using “the most commonly used approach system.“

Not everyone seems impressed with the notion of GPS-controlled, reduced emission travel. 

“The FAA has gone to great lengths to advertise NextGen as the panacea to all issues involving our enormous air traffic control system”, Jim Marinitti and Mitch Herrick, National Air Traffic Controllers Association Local MIA (Miami International Airport) president and vice-president, stated together. 

They added: “The event scheduled for this week with the American Airlines aircraft is simply a publicity stunt.  The flight will be using Global Positioning System technology that we have been using for years.”