Heres an alternative view but the message is the same, we ain't got any not even one little, to waste.
Flight Intl again 11-17 Oct 2005
Aviation urged to press fuel claim
Consultant calls on automobile industry to become more energy effcient to safeguard oil stocks for aircraft
The air transport industry must put pressure on automotive manufacturers to introduce fuel-efficient road vehicles to ensure security of fuel supply for air transport, says a report by consultancy Meridian International Research.
While the air transport industry is the most sensitive to rising oil prices, technology to allow it to drastically reduce fossil fuel consumption is not yet developed. However, fuel-efficient motor vehicle technologies are much more advanced, and in some cases are already being introduced.
“The air transport industry cannot easily reduce oil consumption – except by grounding aircraft. Air transport is too important to the functioning of the world to allow that,” says William Tahil, research director at Meridian, an independent strategy research and technology consultancy based in France.
The introduction of plug-in hybrid and battery-powered electric road vehicles would take the pressure off fossil-fuel supplies and allow time for biojet fuel to become a feasible option to replace part of the 230 billion litres of jet fuel that are burned worldwide each year, the report says.
Developments in technology allowing biodiesel fuel to be used in aircraft will cut the use of fossil fuels in air transport in the longer term, Tahil says.
But the logistics of growing enough biofuel crops and the advances in technology needed to use biofuels in aviation mean this is a longer-term option: “The resources are there. If they are put into place they could replace significant amounts of jet fuel over the next 10-20 years, but what is needed is the recognition that they must be put into place.”
But airlines need to take a holistic approach, and industry bodies like the International Air Transport Association should put pressure on motor manufacturing associations and manufacturers themselves to cut fuel consumption, according to Tahil: “Our economic future depends on oil prices coming down to reasonable levels – the air transport sector is vital to the smooth functioning of global industry.”
HELEN MASSY-BERESFORD/LONDON
The International Air Transport Association’s chief economist Brian Pearce predicts that as clean coal, renewable and hydrogen power generation technologies gain ground, oil demand will fall in the long-term. “That will leave plenty of oil left to refine jet fuel until the next aircraft fuel comes along. Meanwhile, the industry will continue improving fuel efficiency and investing R&D into alternative energy sources,” he says.
The “peak oil” theory – that oil production will reach a peak and then decline, with the peak year known only once it has passed – is “a serious issue”, Pearce says. “However, even if no additional oil reserves are discovered, at current rates of consumption there are 40 years of oil left, which should give the world time to develop new energy sources.