Air New Zealand Boeing makes environment-friendly flight

Air New Zealand, the national flag carrier of New Zealand, has shown the way in saving fuel, cutting flying time as well as curbing harmful carbon emissions.

Aspire 1 logo

The Boeing 777ER plane of Air New Zealand, formally dubbed ASPIRE 1 (Asia and South Pacific Initiative to Reduce Emissions), made a trip from Auckland in New Zealand to San Francisco International Airport in the United States using new technologies and procedures that resulted in reducing flying time, saving 1,200 gallons of fuel and eliminating 30,000 pounds of harmful carbon emissions.

Air New Zealand, based in Auckland, New Zealand, focuses on Australasia and the South Pacific, with services to Europe, North America and Asia. It is a member of Star Alliance.

The flight with Boeing 777 was unofficially called ‘the perfect flight’ to reflect Air New Zealand’s ambitious plan to operate the most efficient flight possible

The ‘perfect flight’ – using optimal flying conditions – was the result of the cooperation of aviation authorities in the United States, New Zealand and Australia.

Air New Zealand, according its chief executive officer Rob Fyfe, has been in the forefront of finding new ways of making flights more environment-friendly and fuel-efficient. In December 2008, Air New Zealand plans to fly a Boeing 747 jumbo jet partially powered by fuel refined from the seeds of the weed called jatropha.

At Auckland Airport, the demonstration flight took off on September 12, 2008. About 15 minutes before departure, David Morgan, Air New Zealand’s general manager for operations and safety, spoke on the plane’s public-address system to unsuspecting passengers that they were part of a test flight.

For the ‘perfect flight,’ the ground crew of the ASPIRE 1 waited until 20 minutes before departure, under a new “just in time fueling” procedure intended to top off the plane’s fuel tank. Because of this, the amount of fuel would be based closer to the actual passenger load, which showed that the plane was 1,800 pounds lighter than expected and did not need as much fuel as initially estimated, David Morgan said.

As passengers began boarding, the aircraft relied on the Auckland Airport’s electrical power instead of its own auxiliary power unit to save fuel.

About three and a half hours into the flight, the plane made a slight shift of about 100 miles to the east after receiving an updated weather and wind report via satellite. No one on the plane except the pilot was aware that the flight path had been changed.

A second weather update received about 6 hours later, as the plane approached the Hawaiian Islands, made the pilot adjust the plane’s path once again.

Since airliners normally follow a predetermined route that is planned before takeoff, the flight path can differ significantly from the shortest route possible between two points on the globe.

As the ‘Aspire 1’ approached San Francisco International Airport, it began a gradual descent that was smoother and quieter than usual. The plane followed a “tailored approach” – in which air-traffic controllers worked with the airline to have the plane descend in a straight line, as though it were on cruise control, without having to throttle the jet engines up and down to follow the typical “step-down” landing pattern.

The ASPIRE 1 flight consumed 4,600 liters less fuel than normal which translated into 12 tons less CO2 emissions.

Los Angeles Times newspaper quoted officials of Air New Zealand and the United States Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the agency of the United States Department of Transportation with authority to regulate and oversee all aspects of civil aviation in the US, as saying that the “perfect flight” could mark the first major step in altering the way airlines operate their planes.

Robert Sturgell, acting administrator of the FAA, said after the Air New Zealand flight, with 270 passengers on board, touched down at San Francisco International Airport: “Today is just a great day for aviation. Clearly, we are headed in the right direction.”

The FAA, Sturgell revealed, hopes to implement the landing procedure at Los Angeles International Airport in 2009.

David Morgan, Air New Zealand general manager for operations and safety who headed the environment-friendly initiative, said shortly after the plane landed about 10 minutes ahead of schedule: “All in all, it was a very successful flight. It exceeded our expectations.”

Most passengers, the Los Angeles Times reported, praised the initiative, but some also asked if savings in cost would translate into lower air fares.

Officials of Air New Zealand could not say for certain if air fares would be affected, especially if oil prices begin climbing again. However, David Morgan said: “With the airline industry facing billions of dollars in losses this year, the latest initiative is designed to help the airlines get to a more sustainable footing. Though fuel savings have become a larger goal, the flight was initially intended to demonstrate how airlines could cut carbon dioxide emissions.”

Airliners contribute about 3% of the carbon emissions worldwide. Some scientists are of the opinion that emissions from planes are more harmful because they take place higher up in the atmosphere.