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BA Whistleblower Reveals Tankering of Fuel - BBC

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BA Whistleblower Reveals Tankering of Fuel - BBC

Old 14th Nov 2019, 10:13
  #161 (permalink)  
 
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I fill my car with petrol once a fortnight. Perhaps I should just put enough in, each day, for the trips that day. How much tankering is there in 30 million UK cars. Perhaps that may help to put some perspective on this.

I'm not a pilot, just SLF, but this sort of "outrage" gets my goat. In my mind it represents a total failure to think an issue through
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Old 14th Nov 2019, 11:34
  #162 (permalink)  
 
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Originally Posted by flight_mode
I wonder how much CO2 would be saved if we didnt need to fly around, rather than over France several times a year.

I wonder how much CO2 would be saved if we didnt spend 30 minutes drawing race tracks over London.

I wonder how much CO2 would be saved if we didnt have to drive aircraft from Polderbaan across the Netherlands to the terminal, then wait another 20 minutes for a gate.

I'll spell it out for you: "TOO MANY AIRCRAFT".
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Old 14th Nov 2019, 11:51
  #163 (permalink)  
 
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Originally Posted by Ian W
There are no observations in the real atmosphere that show that CO2 has any impact on atmospheric temperature. The adiabatic lapse rates are not affected by CO2 and these are repeatedly confirmed by balloon sondes..
How could CO2 concentrations possibly affect adiabatic lapse rates, which are caused by expansion due to reduced pressure with altitude? It seems you are muddling adiabatic lapse rates with environmental lapse rates, which are indeed affected by a whole host of factors.
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Old 14th Nov 2019, 12:04
  #164 (permalink)  
 
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Originally Posted by Slfsfu
I fill my car with petrol once a fortnight. Perhaps I should just put enough in, each day, for the trips that day. How much tankering is there in 30 million UK cars. Perhaps that may help to put some perspective on this.
No need, there are already several posts above explaining the difference in the respective numbers between tankering fuel in the air and on the road.

Unless you have a car that does 550 mph at 35,000 ft, that is.
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Old 14th Nov 2019, 12:07
  #165 (permalink)  
 
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Yeah, but think about number of cars doing this daily.

&
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Old 14th Nov 2019, 14:05
  #166 (permalink)  
 
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Originally Posted by old,not bold
Yes, it does, doesn't it, but I left it there because that's what the ICAO Carbon Emissions Calculator (also linked in my last post) produced for an A320 family LHR-MUC. Or maybe I misinterpreted it; I put the link in so that people could check. (Hint............................. and when you have done that, please let me know if you get a substantially different figure.)
Sorry for slow response...for completeness and to try and close out this particular sub-discussion about A320s and european sectors ... having consulted a current flight planning source (not the ICAO Calculator) I reckon 3000 kg, plus or minus maybe a hundred or two as burn for LHR-MUC on a 320, maybe 4 tonnes for a 321 at typical weights might be a reasonably accurate figure.
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Old 14th Nov 2019, 19:28
  #167 (permalink)  
 
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Why doesn’t the United Nations offer all the carbon offset taxes it’s raising/raised since this (ponzi) scheme was introduced to anyone or any organization that can design a massive scale carbon sink that can capture atmospheric CO2/methane etc so we can use our human ingenuity to solve the problem rather than transferring cash around. You can’t buy your way to heaven and also I have an unformed opinion about the carbon credit scheme and the way it’s set up. If you’re setting caps per head of population and making polluting countries buy cap space of relatively low polluting countries it’s a neat way of transferring wealth from the first world to the third world..not enough questions about the purpose of the system are being asked
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Old 15th Nov 2019, 02:29
  #168 (permalink)  
 
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Can I also make a valid point here.

As everyone is moaning about the effects of flying on the earth etc, I haven’t seen anyone from the eco-society make a fuss regarding Qantas’ LHR-SYD flight today, as part of an ‘experiment’!

So the snowflakes aren’t happy when an Airline tankers to save fuel, to keeps cost low. But when it comes to experiments and p1ssing away profits, that’s totally fine!

Talk about hypocrisy at its finest!

OMAA
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Old 15th Nov 2019, 06:07
  #169 (permalink)  
 
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Originally Posted by OMAAbound
Can I also make a valid point here.

As everyone is moaning about the effects of flying on the earth etc, I haven’t seen anyone from the eco-society make a fuss regarding Qantas’ LHR-SYD flight today, as part of an ‘experiment’!

So the snowflakes aren’t happy when an Airline tankers to save fuel, to keeps cost low. But when it comes to experiments and p1ssing away profits, that’s totally fine!
Your point might not be completely valid..AFAIK it's the second leg of the delivery flight, so unless they were going to ship the hull from Seattle to Sydney it was going to have to be flown there anyway.. (though I accept routing via LHR my be somewhat suboptimal from an environmental POV)

https://simpleflying.com/qantas-london-project-sunrise/
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Old 15th Nov 2019, 11:19
  #170 (permalink)  
 
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Originally Posted by Luke SkyToddler
Airstripflyer makes the relevant point

If you tanker fuel to a place like the Seychelles or Kathmandu because it's expensive, that fuel has ALREADY been tankered there in trucks and boats. Which are less efficient than planes in the first place.

If you tanker fuel from a place like Jeddah because it's cheaper than LHR - well guess where the fuel in the pumps in LHR came from?
Excellent point!
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Old 15th Nov 2019, 12:05
  #171 (permalink)  
 
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Originally Posted by wiggy
Your point might not be completely valid..AFAIK it's the second leg of the delivery flight, so unless they were going to ship the hull from Seattle to Sydney it was going to have to be flown there anyway.. (though I accept routing via LHR my be somewhat suboptimal from an environmental POV)

https://simpleflying.com/qantas-london-project-sunrise/
Not entirely, they’ve flown it SEA-LAX-LHR-SYD and in the process burned well in excess of 150 tonnes of fuel. All in the name of an experiment.

Haven’t heard anyone from #TeamEco beating Qantas about doing such a irresponsible thing!

OMAA
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Old 15th Nov 2019, 15:55
  #172 (permalink)  
 
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To be fair, if you're doing 150T for SEA-LAX-LHR-SYD - over 30 hours in the air, that is bloody good efficiency in comparison to the older types!

The 787 probably does LHR-PER with less fuel than a 747 from LHR-MIA. These efficiency improvements are conveniently forgotten by the eco mob.
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Old 15th Nov 2019, 16:06
  #173 (permalink)  
 
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Originally Posted by OMAAbound


Not entirely, they’ve flown it SEA-LAX-LHR-SYD and in the process burned well in excess of 150 tonnes of fuel. All in the name of an experiment.

Haven’t heard anyone from #TeamEco beating Qantas about doing such a irresponsible thing!

OMAA
You need to get out more. The environmental impact was ALL they talked about on every news feed I saw on this story.

In fact the head of Qantas basically said that as aviation globally only contributes 2% of the CO2 , Its a non issue.
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Old 15th Nov 2019, 16:16
  #174 (permalink)  
 
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Originally Posted by aerodestination
The reason why fuel is way more expensive at some places is because of the costs to get the fuel to that place.
And what are the effects of local fuel taxes on the cost? I suspect that a part of the outrage being manufactured here is due to the loss of revenue at a few pricey airports.
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Old 15th Nov 2019, 16:31
  #175 (permalink)  
 
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Originally Posted by TURIN
You need to get out more. The environmental impact was ALL they talked about on every news feed I saw on this story.

In fact the head of Qantas basically said that as aviation globally only contributes 2% of the CO2 , Its a non issue.
My apologies as I haven’t seen anything, I’ve been polluting the planet carrying vital pharmaceuticals to the USA.

As a skeptic in the whole global warming campaign, and most of us have stated already on here, Aviation contributes a minor part to it, and the minor part to which it contributes is worthwhile. The pharmaceutical supplies my cargo company just delivered, the numerous thousands of aid workers airlines carry around the world, the food it’s supplies, the water it carries, the clothing it supplies... The list is endless.

This thread has slightly drifted, but, tankering will continue as long as airlines continue to operate! Period!

OMAA
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Old 15th Nov 2019, 16:45
  #176 (permalink)  
 
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Originally Posted by ETOPS
Most mornings over Heathrow there is a queue of aircraft holding as they wait for the 0600 curfew to end. At times this builds from around 0545 and often involves 12 or so aircraft. I did it myself for a couple of decades so tried to calculate my "extra" carbon emisions based on average air holding times - I ran out of zeros on my calculator.

This holding is far more damaging than tankering and I did try to avoid it by slowing down en-route but arriving at the back of that queue still brought the dreaded " take up the hold at Lambourne - maintain FL 160 - at least 20 mins delay"..........
I second that, as can every BA pilot. Whenever I am challenged by a person who is anti LHR third runway, I tell them about the huge amount of fuel wasted in holding patterns. Generally, I get looked at in disbelief.
We should be doing much more as an industry, we should be highlighting the efficiencies we continue to make. We should emphasise the efficiency of moving (E.g.) 62,000 tonnes of payload from Mumbai to LHR in ten hours at a cost of about 72 tonnes of fuel. Compare that with a cruise ship I was on recently which carried 568 pax for 17 days burning 75 tonnes of Bunker oil per day while she was sailing. Aviation needs to blow its trumpet much more loudly, and emphasise that one pax’s fuel/mile in a B777-300ER is vastly more efficient than two pax’s fuel/mile using a typical family car in the UK.
Vasco (Retd BA 777s)
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Old 15th Nov 2019, 17:21
  #177 (permalink)  
 
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Originally Posted by Vasco dePilot
I second that, as can every BA pilot. Whenever I am challenged by a person who is anti LHR third runway, I tell them about the huge amount of fuel wasted in holding patterns.
And you should continue to do so.

Having said that, how can you be sure that if and when LHR build a 3rd runway, airlines won't add routes and schedules up to the point where the airport is back operating at 99% capacity, but now with 1½ runways' worth of arrival holding ? Or are you suggesting that the airport should operate 24/7 ?
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Old 15th Nov 2019, 17:48
  #178 (permalink)  
 
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LHR



Dave, we can speculate it could lead to same holding plus extra for third runway. Your guess is as good as mine.
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Old 15th Nov 2019, 18:56
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Originally Posted by DaveReidUK
Having said that, how can you be sure that if and when LHR build a 3rd runway, airlines won't add routes and schedules up to the point where the airport is back operating at 99% capacity, but now with 1½ runways' worth of arrival holding ?
It's called "induced demand" commonly know as "build it and they will come"
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Old 15th Nov 2019, 23:57
  #180 (permalink)  
 
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We should be doing much more as an industry, we should be highlighting the efficiencies we continue to make. We should emphasise the efficiency of moving (E.g.) 62,000 tonnes of payload from Mumbai to LHR in ten hours at a cost of about 72 tonnes of fuel. Compare that with a cruise ship I was on recently which carried 568 pax for 17 days burning 75 tonnes of Bunker oil per day while she was sailing
You're not shifting 62000 tonnes of payload for the price of 72 tonnes of fuel. Maybe 62 tonnes. And that's pretty poor bang for the buck compared to shipping (unless time is cruicial)

Edit: If you actually meant 62 tonnes there was no need for decimals..
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