Flights with Virgin Atlantic to be Greener

Low carbon fuel to be used by Virgin Atlantic

Virgin Atlantic has revealed plans to make their flights even more environmentally friendly by using low carbon fuel over the next two to three years. The 'green' aviation fuel has come about as a collaboration between the airline and the LanzaTech company, offering a new way to power jet aircraft.

In recent times more and more customers have become increasingly environmentally minded, yet the aviation industry continues to require huge amounts of fuel. However, the new technology by LanzaTech uses the waste gases from steel production by capturing, fermenting and then chemically converting them into biofuels. This process prevents excess gases from being released as carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, thus reducing the overall carbon footprint.

Sir Richard Branson revealed the new partnership saying "We were the first commercial airline to test a biofuel flight and we continue to lead the airline industry as the pioneer of sustainable aviation. This partnership to produce a next generation, low-carbon aviation fuel is a major step towards radically reducing our carbon footprint, and we are excited about the savings that this technology could help us achieve." He added that the fuel was sustainable, scalable and could be created at comparable costs to current fuel, allowing the aviation industry to become far more environmentally efficient.

Posted by Raef, 12 October 2011 13:56

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