Gallery: Aviation Goes Full Speed Ahead To Reach Net-Zero Targets

Etihad Airways and fuel producer World Energy cooperated on the first net-zero flight using a book-and-claim system. World Energy displaced 26,000 gal. of petroleum-based jet fuel with an equivalent volume of SAF at Los Angeles International Airport.

Life-cycle emission reduction from this SAF use offset 250 metric tons of carbon related to Etihad’s Boeing 787 flight from Washington Dulles International Airport to Abu Dhabi. Using a book-and-claim system developed by the Roundtable on Sustainable Biomaterials, Etihad was credited for the emissions reduction with SAF certificates issued when World Energy blended the SAF.
 

British Airways is offering customers the chance to address their emissions from flying by purchasing certified carbon removal credits. This innovative new approach has been made possible through the airline’s new upgraded climate platform, CO2llaborate, marking another milestone in the airline’s BA Better World sustainability journey.

Customers are able to calculate and learn about their flight emissions, and then buy carbon removals credits before or after they fly, or directly from their seat on the aircraft. While the carbon removal industry is still comparatively small in scale, scientists, governments and regulators including the United Nations recognize carbon removal projects as a vital tool to help address climate change.
 

Rolls-Royce and easyJet conducted a ground test on an early concept demonstrator using green hydrogen created by wind and tidal power. Both companies said this marks a major step toward proving that hydrogen could be a zero carbon aviation fuel of the future and is a key proof point in the decarbonisation strategies of both Rolls-Royce and easyJet.

The test took place at an outdoor test facility at MoD Boscombe Down, UK using a converted Rolls-Royce AE 2100-A regional aircraft engine. Green hydrogen for the tests was supplied by EMEC (European Marine Energy Centre), generated using renewable energy at their hydrogen production and tidal test facility on Eday in the Orkney Islands, UK.
 

Embraer unveiled two 19-30-seat aircraft concepts (with rear-mounted engines) under its net-zero Energia initiative: hybrid-electric Energia Hybrid and hydrogen-powered Energia H2. While still at the evaluation phase, the architectures and technologies are being assessed for technical and commercial viability. 
 

United Airlines Ventures (UAV) strategic investment in NEXT Renewable Fuels (NEXT), which is permitting a flagship biofuel refinery in Port Westward, Oregon. It is expected to begin production in 2026. NEXT is a Houston-based company developing the biorefinery, which, at full production, could produce up to 50,000 barrels per day of SAF, renewable diesel and other renewable fuels. UAV said it could invest as much as $37.5 million in NEXT.
 

Airbus and Air Canada have invested in Canada’s Carbon Engineering, a pioneer in direct air capture of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) for permanent underground storage or use in production of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).

Squamish, British Columbia-based Carbon Engineering (CE) is the technology provider to 1PiontFive, a carbon capture, utilization and sequestration company that plans to deploy at least 70 direct air capture (DAC) plants globally by 2035, each with a capacity of 1 million metric tons of CO2 per year.
 

Ampaire has flown the first Cessna Caravan converted to hybrid-electric propulsion.The prototype Eco Caravan made the 33-min. flight Nov. 18 from Camarillo Airport, California, north of Los Angeles.

Ampaire is developing an integrated parallel-hybrid propulsion system that combines a compression-ignition combustion engine burning jet fuel with an electric motor powered by batteries housed in the rear of the Grand Caravan’s underbelly cargo pod, preserving the aircraft’s passenger and cargo capacity.
 

Paris airports operator Groupe ADP has inaugurated its first solar park in the south of France as part of a long-term agreement on renewable electricity supply it signed in 2020.

Under the contract, three new solar parks will be built and the electricity they generate will be sold to ADP. The newly opened park is in Caveirac in the southern Gard region.
 

Germany has launched a project to develop a process to convert sustainably produced methanol into sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) that can be integrated into existing fossil-fuel production plants.

The starting point for the 2.5-year, €3.1 million ($3.2 million) Methanol-to-SAF (M2SAF) project is green methanol produced from CO2 and green hydrogen. The SAF produced by the power-to-liquid (PtL) process can be used as up to a 100% drop-in replacement for fossil jet fuel.
 

German sustainable airline startup Evia Aero signed a letter of intent (LOI) with the UK’s Cranfield Aerospace Solutions (CAeS) for 10 hydrogen-electric-powered 19-passenger aircraft. This is in addition to an LoI with CAeS for 15 hydrogen fuel-cell propulsion conversion kits for 9-passenger Britten-Norman Islanders. 

Deliveries of the hydrogen-powered Islanders are scheduled to begin in 2026, followed by 19-seaters a couple of years later. Evia has also signed an LOI with US-based Eviation for 25 Alice all-electric 9-passenger regional aircraft, with deliveries expected to begin in 2027.
 

JetBlue and Fidelis New Energy inked an MOU to provide JetBlue at least 92 million gallons of blended SAF from Fidelis’ Grön Fuels GigaSystem at the Port of Greater Baton Rouge in Louisiana. This SAF is expected to be delivered over the five-year term with a targeted start date of 2025. This is the third major contract JetBlue has signed with a fuel producer that has yet to begin SAF production. The airline has a target of convert 10% of its fuel use to SAF by 2030, from less than 1% today.

In addition, Air France-KLM Group forged an agreement with TotalEnergies to supply 800,000 metric tons (264 million gal.) of SAF over 10 years starting in 2023, mainly for flights from France and the Netherlands.