Boeing eyes jetliners fuelled by waste in race to zero emissions

Bloomberg

Boeing Co set a target of designing and certifying its jetliners to fly on 100% sustainable fuels by 2030 amid rising pressure on planemakers to get serious about climate change.
Regulators currently allow a 50-50 blend of sustainable and conventional fuels, and Boeing said it would work with authorities to raise the limit. Rival Airbus SE is considering another tack: a futuristic lineup of hydrogen-powered aircraft that would reach the skies by 2035.
The aircraft manufacturers face growing public clamour to cut emissions in the aviation
industry, which added more
than 1 billion metric tons of
carbon dioxide to the atmosphere in 2019, according to BloombergNEF. Boeing has the added challenges of closing Airbus’s yawning lead in narrow-body jet sales and grappling with $61 billion in debt.
“Sustainable aviation fuels are proven, used every day, and have the most immediate and greatest potential to reduce carbon emissions in the near and long term,” Chris Raymond, Boeing’s chief sustainability officer, said in a statement. Both Boeing and Airbus face huge obstacles.
While the US planemaker is relying on technology honed in test flights since 2008, it needs to find a feedstock that doesn’t damage rain forests and other habitats, said aerospace consultant Richard Aboulafia. For Boeing’s first commercial flight using
biofuels, a Virgin Atlantic 747 jumbo was powered by oil from coconuts and babassu nuts, a palm tree grown in the Amazon.
“It’s a question of making something that’s sustainable
and non-ecologically ruinous,” Aboulafia said.