Aircraft design and engine efficiency

Improvements made to aircraft design in order to make planes use fuel more efficiently, could result in an increase in efficiency of new aircraft of 35-45% by 2025 relative to new aircraft today.

Potential fuel savings from evolutionary measures by 2025

Examples of this include improving the efficiency of engines and reducing the weight of aircraft by replacing some metals by lighter composite materials in their structures. The design and shape of planes can also be made more aerodynamic. This will ensure that less carbon is emitted as planes use less fuel.

Major aircraft manufacturers are planning to introduce these improvements to new narrow-body aircraft families in the 2020s.

There are also more radical technological innovations that could have the potential to significantly reduce emissions from planes. For example, using open rotor engines (where fan blades are not surrounded by casing), or improving airframe aerodynamics (by flattening the profile of wings so that they are better blended to the aircraft body). These sorts of technologies have the potential to make new aircraft up to 60% more efficient by 2050, compared to 2006 levels.

Developing these technologies would however require high levels of investment.


Air Traffic Management

The way that air traffic and airplanes are managed and operated at airports can also make a difference.

Improving air traffic management and operations could together reduce emissions by up to 13% by 2050; for example by managing flights so that a greater proportion of them are flown direct to their destination, at optimal heights, and without being held outside airports.

There is also a correlation between at what capacity airports are operating at and the average holding time before flights can land. According to NATS, aircraft arriving to the UK that are circling before landing account for roughly 2% of CO₂ emissions. Three quarters of these emissions are generated at Heathrow (which currently operates at 99% capacity).

Capacity Utilisation and holding

Improvements can be made to the way that planes are operated by maximising the amount of freight that is carried in addition to seats that are occupied, and by reducing space that is not used in plane cabins. Also improving airport operations e.g. ground towing could contribute to reductions.


Potential savings from technology improvements

Improvements to the efficiency of engines, airframe design and air traffic management have the potential to deliver an annual improvement in the efficiency with which fuel is used in planes of 0.8% to 1.5%.

The Committees current expectation is that the lower end of this range (i.e. a 0.8% annual improvement to fuel efficiency) is likely to be achieved by 2050.

However, if there was earlier deployment and introduction of some of the more radical technologies, changes to aircraft design and management have the potential to deliver a maximum of 1.5% improvement each year in fuel efficiency.