Jetliner Crosses Atlantic Without Using Fossil Fuels

Virgin Atlantic 787 used high-fat fuel instead
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Nov 30, 2023 9:35 AM CST
Jetliner Crosses Atlantic Without Using Fossil Fuels
Virgin Atlantic Flight 100 arrives at John F. Kennedy International Airport on Tuesday.   (Jason DeCrow/AP Images for Virgin Atlantic Airways Ltd.)

The first commercial airliner to cross the Atlantic on a purely high-fat, low-emissions fuel flew Tuesday from London to New York in a step toward achieving what supporters called "jet zero." The Virgin Atlantic Boeing 787 flight was powered without using fossil fuels, relying on so-called sustainable aviation fuel made up largely of tallow and other waste fats, the AP reports. "The world will always assume something can't be done, until you do it," said Virgin founder Richard Branson, who was aboard the flight with others, including corporate and government officials, engineers, and journalists.

The UK Transport Department, which provided $1.27 million to plan and operate the flight, called the test a "huge step towards jet zero" to make air travel more environmentally friendly, though large hurdles remain in making the fuel widely available. While governments have long talked about decarbonizing air travel, the transition has been moving at the pace of a dirigible. Sustainable aviation fuel, which reduces greenhouse gas emissions by about 70%, is the best near-term way for the international aviation industry to achieve its net zero target by 2050, the US Energy Department said, though it called the goal aspirational.

Holly Boyd-Boland, vice president of corporate development at Virgin Atlantic, said the flight shows that the fuel can power existing aircraft, but the challenge is ramping up production to "get to enough volume so that we're flying more sustainable aviation fuel every day." But the group Aviation Environment Federation said the aviation industry was making misleading claims about the impact of sustainable fuel on carbon emissions. "The idea that this flight somehow gets us closer to guilt-free flying is a joke," said policy director Cait Hewitt. Sustainable aviation fuel represents "around 0.1% of aviation fuel globally and will be very hard to scale up sustainably."

story continues below

While this is the first jetliner to make the trans-Atlantic journey using only the sustainable fuel, it wasn't a commercial flight and not the first jet to do so. Gulfstream Aerospace was the first to make the crossing earlier this month with a business jet powered only by the eco-fuel. Air France-KLM flew from Paris to Montreal two years ago using a mix of petroleum-based jet fuel and a synthetic derived from waste cooking oils.

(More aviation stories.)

Get the news faster.
Tap to install our app.
X
Install the Newser News app
in two easy steps:
1. Tap in your navigation bar.
2. Tap to Add to Home Screen.

X