Six and a half flying ideas for the future

Sophia Cheng / 10 min read / Digital Nomad Days

21 April 2020

Guest blog post originally written for FlightFree UK.

I’m what you might call a recovering flying addict. I love to travel and invariably enjoyed air travel too. I have opinions on where exactly to best sit on the plane (always window), which airlines did better food, when it was worth paying for priority boarding or not. I am also the perfect size for flying; my legs aren’t too long, and as a bit of a contortionist with a super power for sleep, I have a suite of positions to get comfy. I built my identity and more recently my life around flying as a digital nomad. So taking the FlightFree pledge has meant a major overhaul in my lifestyle. While I’m attempting to stay still more, I couldn’t ignore that itch in Paris (by train) to the ChangeNOW Summit to find out how we might be able to travel by air in a sustainable way. Is it even possible?

An 80 min discussion was headed up by Michael Gill, Executive Director of ATAG the Aviation Travel Action Group.

“We are not burying our heads in the sand; we are facing our responsibilities, we’re tackling the problem.”

Flight shame was even mentioned.

Barbara van Koppen heads up the CSR at KLM, who launched the ‘Fly Responsibly’ campaign last year, admitted on behalf of her industry; “we have been insensitive in the past, the flight shame [movement] has put us under scrutiny and it came as a surprise. Sentiments to aviation and climate change have shifted very quickly.”

She added; “offsetting is not a long-term solution in aviation.”

1. SAF or Sustainable Aviation Fuel
   SAF is an acronym that might be worth remembering, this area of development is growing fast, according to Theye Veen from Sky NRG.
   • SAF uses “waste oils from biological origin, agricultural residues or non-fossil CO2”, that could include cooking oil, food scraps, grass clippings and agriculture residue but also non-bio materials including packaging, paper and municipal waste. Other sources include energy crops like salt marsh grasses and algae. Importantly, it can be locally sourced.
   • It is then blended with traditional aviation fuel, currently at 50%.
   • It emits 80% less CO2 than kerosene.
   • It works within the existing aviation fuel infrastructure, called a ‘drop in’ replacement.

Questions it prompted from me:

• SAF tackles CO2 emissions from the extraction of the oil – but what about the emissions while the plane is in the air?
• How wise is it really to run a fuel that relies on waste, thereby incentivising consumption?
• Is SAF prone to greenwashing? Currently the blend to conventional kerosene is 50:50, with the aviation industry still set to grow, that’s still a lot of kerosene.

2. New plane designs
   Effort is going into completely reimagining what a plane could look like. KLM are working with a technology university to develop a ‘Flying V’ design.

   • This redesign puts passengers and cargo in the wings of the plane, reducing the overall weight and aerodynamic drag. This concept can hold as many passengers as the latest Airbuses and is supposed to be 20% more fuel efficient.

   Questions it prompted from me:

   • Is a 20% improvement in fuel efficiency good enough given where the climate science stands?
   • Does the world need more planes that are different shapes?

3. Solar Planes
   Bertrand Piccard of Solar Impulse Foundation, was the keynote speaker opening up the ChangeNOW Summit. Piccard and his co-pilot took it in turns and flew 40000 km around the world using solar power in 2016.

4. Electricity and Hybrid planes
   One of the main issues with electric planes is the weight of the battery, so research in this area is focused on short flights but that hasn’t impeded the ambition.

   Questions it raised for me:

   • Just like conversations around electric cars, talk of electric planes make me nervous.
   • The extraction of raw materials from foreign countries to fuel our consumption in the West is rarely clean.

5. Hydrogen propulsion
   Attempts to overcome some of the challenges of electric planes are developing the hydrogen fuel cell. James Plowman of ZeroAviva explained that the operating costs are much lower and there is even a retrofit solution.

   Questions it raised for me:

   • What will the role of short-haul flights be in a zero-carbon world? And what will the criteria be for justifying one flight over another?

6. Return of the airship
   Curiously named Flying Whales presented their flying of the future; helium airships, primarily aimed at transporting cargo.

   Questions it prompted from me:

   • But aren’t we running out of helium?

6 and a half. Self propelling planes?
While researching for this piece I stumbled across the Ion drive. Building on an idea developed in the 1920s, “the silent system takes a powerful flow of ions generated on board the aircraft and uses it to propel the plane forward over a sustained and steady flight,” reports Silicon Republic.

Where does that leave us in 2020? Every generation has their take on the future of air travel. But how do we marry it up with the scientific consensus on the climate crisis? The focus, and dare I say preoccupation, with solving the carbon flying crisis with technology left me feeling a bit hollow.

ADDED IN APRIL: Covid-19 has abruptly brought flying to a halt and the longer the lockdown continues the more impact it will have on the industry. As airlines scramble for bailouts and optimistically dangle very cheap flights in December, carbon emissions have fallen. Can the industry recover sustainably?

Perhaps the issue isn’t how we grow more sustainably but with the idea of growth itself?

In fact, I think the most radical idea I discovered throughout the whole conference was challenging the idea of travel altogether. Check out Closeby.ch!