Zero emissions, suborbital hops and the return of supersonic – Jenny Southan asks what the future holds for commercial aviation
Aviation has come a long way since the sixth century, when Chinese emperor Wen Hsuan Ti was said to have experimented with tying prisoners to kites and commanding them to jump off towers. However, the first successful flight in an aeroplane didn’t happen until 1903, from which point the industry developed at an exponential rate.
The first commercial jetliner took to the skies in 1949, making flying available to the masses for the first time. Just over a decade later, in 1961, Yuri Gagarin became the first person to enter space and, in 1969, the US put a man on the moon. This was also the year that Concorde, capable of cruising at more than 2,100km/ph, began regular transatlantic flights with British Airways and Air France.
The years that followed were full of optimism and hope. But who was to know that 2003 would see the demise of supersonic flights? It was a moment seen by many as the first time man had slowed down. “Usually we get faster and better at things. With Concorde being grounded, we are almost going backwards,” says Joe Ferry, head of design for Virgin Atlantic. “From everyone’s point of view in the aviation industry, it’s disappointing to see there is no immediate successor to Concorde. I’d be delighted if things such as getting to Australia in a couple of hours could be achieved.”
Oliver Aust, head of communications and public affairs at Easyjet, adds: “Supersonic aircraft design has been de-prioritised – I think Concorde will be the last supersonic aircraft for a long time because there is a trade-off between speed and fuel economy, and we are going for fuel economy these days. I can’t see that changing in an environment where green issues and fuel costs play a large role.”
So what do the manufacturers think? Mike Bair, vice-president of advanced 737 product development for Boeing, says: “It seems odd that if Concorde flew 40 years ago we can’t do it again – it was a magnificent piece of technology but the operating economics were completely outside the realm of what the marketplace could support. We may be in a position in 50 years when it could be technically viable, but it’s really going to be about whether manufacturers can overcome the thermal stresses that are put on the engines.
“On today’s planes the engines are only at maximum power for four or five minutes at take-off. With the supersonic plane you are at maximum power throughout the flight so the engines burn up quickly – it’s a giant maintenance fee. That is what made Concorde so expensive. Supersonic planes also burn more fuel and that translates into higher CO2 emissions.”
Still, Bair says that if the propulsion technology was there suddenly, “we could catch up pretty quickly”.
Given that there doesn’t seem to be a successor for Concorde waiting in the wings, what does this mean for the suborbital technology being developed by Virgin Galactic?
Richard Branson’s firm plans to operate flights from the world’s first purpose-built commercial spaceport in New Mexico, expected to be complete late this year. But Bair says: “Suborbital flights have the same kinds of problems as supersonic – it’s incredibly inefficient and we just don’t see a technology suite that looks like it could come together to make it economically viable.”
Abu Dhabi’s Aabar Investments thinks differently. Last summer the company announced it was putting US$280 million into Virgin Galactic in return for a 32 per cent stake in its holding company. And late last year, Aabar revealed its intention for Abu Dhabi and Los Angeles to be used as hubs, between which Virgin Galactic craft could fly in two to three hours.
Ambitious plans, but whether they come to fruition is another thing. All the same, with manufacturers no longer offering supersonic technology for commercial aviation, or airlines demanding it, aircraft design is moving in other directions. In 2007 the world’s biggest passenger airliner, the twin-deck, double-aisle A380 superjumbo, entered service. With a maximum capacity of 853 people in an all-economy class configuration, it was a big step up from the B747 jumbo that seated up to 539.
More recently, the B787 Dreamliner had its first flight in December, sporting a number of innovative design features – most significantly, its lighter, all-composite fuselage made from carbon fibre reinforced plastic, as opposed to aluminium. Not only is the 787 more fuel-efficient than its heavier counterparts, but passengers will enjoy improved cabin conditions.
Bair explains: “On almost all of today’s planes, when you are at cruise altitude the atmosphere inside the cabin is equivalent to being at 9,000 feet, meaning low humidity and not a lot of oxygen – this is the reason you don’t feel good at the end of a six- or a 12-hour flight. But because of the composite structure of the 787 we were able to lower the altitude to 6,000 feet – from sea level to 6,000 feet, there’s virtually no difference.”
With a growing emphasis on care for the environment, investment in “green” technology is also on the radar, and a number of airlines, including Qatar Airways, BA, Virgin, KLM and Air New Zealand, are working to develop biofuel. This requires little or no modification to an aircraft’s engines, meaning the planes of the future will not necessarily have to be radically redesigned to be more environmentally friendly. Bair says: “Sustainably grown biofuels [from sources such as algae, sugarcane and jatropha seeds] will give us the kind of fuel that we get from oil today and get it in a way that is carbon neutral.”
However, Easyjet is not convinced that biofuels are the short- or even medium-term answer. Oliver Aust says: “Maybe by 2040 or 2050 biofuels might be making a more meaningful contribution, but it will be fairly small because we can only produce so much biofuel without affecting food crops.”
The budget carrier is championing the green cause in a different way, by campaigning for a change in the way aircraft are manufactured. It argues that future big polluters such as India and China, whose aviation industry is yet to boom, will only be kept in check if emissions are controlled at the source.
Manufacturing giants Boeing and Airbus supply the majority of the world’s commercial fleets, which means that if governments set minimum standards for CO2 emissions that all aircraft have to meet, as is the case for fridges and cars, the negative impact on the environment will have been limited before the planes are even delivered.
To demonstrate the kind of aircraft Easyjet would be looking to invest in, it has come up with a design for the “Ecojet”, a next-generation, super-clean, short-haul aircraft that would be 25 per cent quieter, emit 50 per cent less CO2 and 75 per cent less nitrogen oxide than a B737 or A320. It would also sport features such as rear-mounted “open-rotor” engines that “give you more thrust for your kerosene”, as Aust puts it.
“We didn’t intend this to be some kind of Star Trek exercise,” he says. “It’s our concept but it’s based on the components of the different ideas that manufacturers are working on. It is absolutely a realistic project. We think aircraft manufacturers should make sure that, say, in 2020, the next-generation of single-aisle, short-haul aircraft – the Ecojet or something like it – is available.”
In the meantime, if Virgin’s Joe Ferry is correct in saying that “reducing environmental impact will be very high on all future aircraft design agendas”, when might we expect to see a revolution in “clean” technology? “If we want to do something like use solar energy or fuel cells, I would have thought the jet engine itself would have to be radically redesigned, and that is a very long programme,” Ferry says. “If solar technology can improve so that it is generating more power with lighter panels, then who knows? Everything is possible.”
Swiss psychiatrist and balloonist Bertrand Piccard, who piloted the first balloon to circle the globe non-stop in 1999, certainly thinks so. He is spearheading a project that will see his plane, Solar Impulse, circumnavigate the world powered only by energy from the sun. The single-seat aircraft, which took six years to develop, is the width of an A340 and has 11,628 photovoltaic cells. It completed a successful test flight in December, proving that this kind of technology is not just the stuff of science fiction.
Still, Easyjet’s Aust is ambivalent. “Solar technology is fantastic but we can’t see it in any meaningful timeframe for commercial aviation – for a very large aircraft you can imagine the amount of solar panels you would need to keep it in the air. Use those panels on the ground and you would get a much better return on your investment.”
Opinion will always be divided when speculating about the future, but one airline that has taken it upon itself to kickstart a debate on the matter is Finnair. Founded in 1923, it marked 85 years of flying in 2008 by launching Departure 2093: Five Visions of Future Flying, an online forum for aviation buffs to predict what the industry will be like in the future. Go to departure2093.com and you can read expert opinions from professors, engineers and designers, as well as leave feedback on the types of aircraft Finnair thinks we might be seeing one day.
The airlines’s range of futuristic designs for the craft of tomorrow include “service ships” that take passengers to a “space hotel” positioned at 500km altitude (see main picture, pages 34-35). Somewhat more down to earth is the proposed 850-seat A600-850M, a wide-bodied, zero-emission supersonic aircraft, not dissimilar to the Concorde in design, with a fuselage made from super-light and super-strong nano-ceramic material. The plane would have wellness and entertainment areas, and “intelligent” seats that adjust to a passenger’s weight and height.
Christer Haglund, Finnair’s senior vice-president of public affairs and corporate communications, believes making predictions can be more than just a bit of fun. “If you put your focus firmly on the future then you have the possibility to steer development,” he says. “One thing I know for sure is that aircraft will not look like [our proposed designs] in 2093, but one of our partners is Airbus, and it has said it is theoretically possible that we could see aircraft like these in the future. It is food for thought. There is so much innovation going on, if you have any breakthrough it might spark off investment.”
So what kind of aircraft do the experts think will be flying in the decades to come? Boeing’s Bair says: “My guess is it will be 100 years until we see dramatic changes in the way we fly. The Dreamliner will be around for a long time – the 747 has been around for 40 years and there is no reason why this one won’t be around for that long, or longer.”
Virgin’s Ferry points out that the way planes are designed is based around commercial constraints, and distinct alterations to the look of aircraft may not come from the manufacturers we are familiar with now. “The A380 was designed at a time when lots of airlines were fighting for slots at airports, when fuel was not that expensive and weight was not an issue. It will be interesting to see if another company starts challenging Airbus and Boeing for supremacy, and that might come from China or India. If we start to see some radical thinking from those places then I think there could be some real change in aviation – sometimes it’s good to have a blank piece of paper and start without any preconceptions. If not, then I think we will see polished versions of the B787, A380 and A350 in the skies.”
Easyjet’s Aust thinks differently: “The A380 is probably the last of its kind in the sense that we believe any more aircraft to be built in the future will look more like the Ecojet. The A380 is as hard as you can push that sort of technology – it doesn’t get any faster or bigger or prettier.”
So while we may live to see the next generation of short-haul aircraft in our lifetime, it is unlikely that we will be flying supersonic on business trips any time soon. But many of us will be experiencing new planes such as the B787, and if travelling domestically in Japan, may get to try out the Mitsubishi Regional Jet (pictured above), the first airliner Japan will have produced since the 1960s. It’s set to be delivered to launch customer ANA in 2014 and features a geared turbo fan engine designed by Pratt and Whitney that is expected to save 40 per cent more fuel compared with a B737-500.
In China, the state-owned Commercial Aircraft Corp of China (Comac) unveiled a model of its 168-seat C919 in February, which is designed to compete with the B737 and A320. The plane is set to enter service in 2016, with the government poised to assign them to Air China, China Southern and China Eastern Airlines. Comac is expecting to build 2,000 C919s over the next 20 years in a bid to become the world’s third biggest plane manufacturer.
The Chinese may have got flying wrong in the past, but their philosophy is spot on – as an old proverb says: “If you want to know your past, look into your present conditions. If you want to know your future, look into your present actions.” So perhaps the future of aviation lies in their hands.
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