Simon Calder explains Virgin Atlantic’s first ‘sustainable aviation fuel’ flight

Simon Calder explains Virgin Atlantic's first 'sustainable aviation fuel' flightSource: Sky News

Transcript

00:00 the so-called tailpipe emissions, it's going to be generating exactly the same amount of

00:06 CO2, which obviously is concerning to climate campaigners.

00:11 What the airlines and indeed the engine makers, Rolls-Royce, say is that actually over the

00:18 lifecycle of the fuel that they're using, it's 70% less damaging.

00:26 That for example, if you're looking at the plant-based part, is that growing the plant,

00:31 they absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

00:34 Effectively, all you're doing is taking that and generating the CO2.

00:40 A lot of environmentalists say there's all sorts of problems with this.

00:44 There are not the environmental benefits that are claimed for sustainable aviation fuel.

00:50 They are overstated.

00:51 Furthermore, you just can't get the stuff, 0.1% of all the fuel used on aviation around

01:00 the world comes from sustainable aviation fuel.

01:05 They say that you've got to scale this up, and you might just find that you run out of

01:10 chip fat and animal fat and solid waste, which is being turned into sustainable aviation

01:18 fuel.

01:19 It's a tricky one.

01:20 The airline says, you've got to start somewhere, and this is a really important proving flight.

01:26 There aren't going to be any paying passengers on board.

01:31 There is going to be Sir Richard Branson, the founder of Virgin Atlantic, as well as

01:35 Mark Harper, the transport secretary.

01:38 When it gets to New York, the engines have to be completely cleaned, the fuel tanks cleaned

01:43 out, and they'll just be using normal kerosene to get back.

01:48 They say, though, this is, for the next couple of decades, the future of flying.