Lilium gets sued, Ryanair buys SAF & more (The Allplane Newsletter #83)
New podcast episode
Guest appearance at the No U-Turn Podcast, talking about advanced air mobility and, more generally, about big trends in aviation. Check it out here!
Sustainable Aviation News
Electric flight
US commuter airline Cape Air, which operates some 400 flights a day across America, has signed a letter of intent for 75 of Eviation’s electric 9-seater aircraft. LINK
Iceland joining the Nordic decarbonization drive, Icelandair sees prospects for alternative propulsion technologies in its domestic operations already within this decade. LINK
Advanced Air Mobility
Supply chains for the eVTOL industry are taking shape. Hexcel is going to supply composites for Archer’s aircraft. LINK.
Lilium is being sued by shareholders that are apparently unhappy with progress being made in its eVTOL development. LINK
Beta Technologies has raised another $375M for its cargo eVTOL programme. LINK
Embraer’s EVE and Thales partner in the eVTOL space. Unclear what this deal will involve beyond “a number of studies to be conducted over a period of 12 months”. LINK
Sustainable Aviation Fuel
Sustainable Aero Lab has mapped the SAF ecosystem. Check out the infographics.
Ryanair will power its Amsterdam flights with 40% SAF supplied by Neste. Quite a high-% blend! LINK
Austrian Airlines has started to receive sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) from, also Austrian, OMV. The supply agreement was signed last December and deliveries started this March. Austrian expects to go from some 2,000 metric tons of SAF this year to 700,000 by 2030. LINK
Hydrogen flight
Sergey Kiselev, ZeroAvia’s CCO, makes the case for hydrogen (obviously). LINK
Other aviation sustainability stories
JetBlue Technology Ventures has invested an undisclosed amount in the TPG Rise Climate Fund, a $6.8B fund that invests in climate solutions at scale. LINK
Etihad will conduct some 50 “eco-flights” to continue testing contrail-avoiding technology and some of the operational improvements that, it claims, reduced carbon emissions by a whooping 72% compared to a similar flight in 2019. LINK
The Dutch advertising regulatory body has ruled that the way KLM presented its off-set programme was misleading, suggesting reforestation programmes erased the environmental impact of flying. LINK
What else in aviation?
It looks like the current financial difficulties and the IAG acquisition imbroglio is not preventing Air Europa from increasing its fleet with 11 new aircraft, 5 Dreamliners, of which 4 wet-leased from Norse Atlantic (first chance to try the new Norwegian airline product?) and 6 B737s. LINK
All-business class, “boutique” airline La Compagnie has launched flights between Milan and New York (Newark, EWR). LINK
The first A321XLR is approaching completion at Airbus in Hamburg. PICS.
New airlines of 2022: the list has been updated. LINK
New article on The Points Guy about hypersonic air travel. A pipe dream? Some startups think it is very feasible and sooner than you expect. Check out my piece here.