United Airlines Focuses on Reducing Carbon Emissions by 50 Percent over the Next Few Decades

The major American Airline, United Airlines plans to reduce the use of fossil fuels in order to minimize its carbon footprint and its dependence on fossil fuels. To build more fuel friendly aircraft, the company will invest more than $2B in one year. It will help the company to use more low-carbon biofuels in daily flights and implement new techniques for better fuel conservation.

On its journey from San Francisco to Zurich (Flight 44), the aircraft will utilize 16,000 gallons of biofuels at a 30/70 blend with conventional jet fuel. The journey would be the longest biofuel-powered travel till date by any U.S. airline.

According to United Airlines, the company’s emission system projected from 2005-2050 is very effective as it can remove the emissions equivalent of removing 4.5 million vehicles from the road each year.

The initiative will help not only in improving the environmental conditions but to guard against oil price instability too. The major part of the airline’s expenses come from fuel, and due to the rising oil price, the industry is being hampered on its profits, sending carriers scrambling to mitigate the impact.

“The airline was “marching toward” recapturing 100 percent of higher fuel expenditures in a year when those costs are already surpassing $2 billion,” said Scott Kirby, president of United Airlines.

The company invested $30 M at Fulcrum BioEnergy, California in 2015, to help the household trash-to-biofuel maker install refineries near its hub airports and purchase roughly 1 billion gallons of biofuel.