'Green' plane

Aircraft can affect the climate because using kerosene oil should release toxic gases, contributing to promoting the greenhouse effect. In the future, this situation will change.

A tourist flying round Paris - New York will pour into 2.5 tons of CO2, equal to the amount of carbon emitted by the person on the ground for five months.

Environmental aircraft: Wing type that can be patted in the air to reduce noise and reduce fuel consumption (Photo: TTO)

On the world level, airplanes are less harmful than cars. In 2000, the amount of CO2 emitted by the aircraft was 664 million tons, accounting for only 2% of the carbon emitted by the whole planet. However, the problem is that air transport is increasing every day. An average of 2 billion passengers travel by air every year. It is expected that by 2050, this figure will reach 9.5 billion. Consequences: 43 more years of CO2 due to air emissions into the atmosphere will triple by now.

Since December 2006, the European Commission has issued a system of emissions quotas for airlines flying in the skies of European Union countries. The commission also requires aircraft manufacturers to develop more environmentally friendly technologies. Many manufacturers are developing environmentally friendly engines. The goal by 2015 is to produce less than 2 times less CO2 emissions.

Currently, for every passenger traveling 100km, the plane burns about 3.5 liters of kerosene. This number will be reduced to 2.9 liters for Boeing 787 or Airbus A380 aircraft. Reducing fuel consumption means reducing emissions.

For many years, machines that do not use kerosene have also been studied such as Bertrand Piccard's Solar Impulse engine (using solar energy) or a roller coaster from Boeing (using fuel cells). As expected, these new products will be tested in 2008.

Clean engines: ' synthetic kerosene ' produced from plant or natural gas waste products (Photo: TTO)

Snecma of France tested ' aircraft oil ', in which bio-oil produced colza for 30%. Boeing said it would send a B747-400 to test with a similar fuel mixture next year.

So far, it is not possible to use 100% biofuel for aircraft because the fuel from vegetable oil on the market today will be frozen at an altitude of 11,000m, when the temperature falls below 42 ^o C. So the studies focused on the ' synthetic kerosene ' produced from plant or natural gas waste.

SWITZERLAND