Air India plans to neutralize carbon emission footprint by 2020

The national carrier Air India has asked the Airport Authority of India (AAI), which manages air traffic in India to allow it's aircraft to land with 'constant descent approach' at the runway, to let it save on fuel, which forms about 40 per cent of the airline's operating cost. At present, due to safety and global aviation regulatory compliance reasons, the aircraft descent is not in straight slant. Instead, during the descending process, the aircraft brings down its altitude by taking a small dip before flying straight for a while. The process continues in small cycles till the final landing is done on the runway.

Harpreet Singh, executive director, flight safety of Air India, while talking about the airline's environment conservation programme said, the initiative has been taken positively by the AAI. "If the idea gets implemented without compromising on any safety issues, then it will help us in saving lot of fuel, thereby helping us save not only on carbon footprint but also save crucial foreign exchange," Singh added.

According to the airline officials, such landing can be made possible only on certain airports, especially during the non-peak hours, when the air traffic is low around at the airport. The airline officials also added that the consequence of low fuel may lead to lowering of air fares for the passengers. The AAI officials were not available for their comment on the issue.

Speaking further on the airline's initiative on fuel saving, Singh said that the airline's pilots are being trained to be more persistent in asking for higher altitude while flying as it helps in saving fuel. "There is no harm in asking for it from the ATC. If there is any possibility, the ATC personnel may allow it," she said.

As per the data available with the airline, so far in the last one year ending March, 2015; the airline has saved around 225 mn kg of carbon emission footprint. With reduction of seven percent in carbon emission in over past five years, and further around two percent reduction in coming two years, Air India plans to turn carbon emission neutral by the year 2020.