Sustainability at Delta Air Lines, visiting VoltAero and more (The Allplane Newsletter #186)
Le’ts see what has happened in aviation sustainability this week:
Amelia DeLuca is Delta Air Line’s Chief Sustainability Officer and she’s been on our podcast to share quite a few details about the way one of the world’s largest airlines (nearly 1,000 aircraft!) is tackling the sustainability challenge.
Advanced Air Mobility
AutoFlight has started to build a new factory in a city that since 2020 has become world-famous: Wuhan! A bit of a departure from the traditional coastal area of activity of Chinese eVTOL developers, but reportedly the company has found strong support from the local authorities there.
Electric Aviation
Visiting one of Europe’s hybrid-electric pioneers, French startup Voltaero: you can find some video and pictures from my visit to the Voltaero’s state-of-the-art HQ in Rochefort, France.
Vaeridion is deepening its collaboration with German industrial giant Bosch. The two firms will cooperate in developing electric systems for the future Microliner nine-seater aircraft.
Btw, Vaeridion also published a white paper about electric regional air mobility.
An interesting article about Airbus’ clean aircraft projects and, particularly, in the promising use of superconductors in fuel cells.
A German company called Volftang is installing a high-performance battery storage system with a total capacity of 540 kWh at Stuttgart Airport.
Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF)
Neste’s SAF refinery in Rotterdam has come on stream. This plant has the capacity to produce 500,000 tons of SAF per year.
Nearly two dozen companies from across the European aviation ecosystem (with a strong Scandi flavour) gathered in Bodø, Norway, to signal their support for e-fuel development plans in the Old Continent. The result is the Bodø declaration.
Volotea is buying 7.5M litres from TotalEnergies through to 2029.
Hydrogen Aviation
Josef Kallo, CTO of H2FLY (who was on the podcast, recently, btw!) is optimistic about having a production-ready hydrogen-powered aircraft by 2030 and said also there’s still financial runway for a couple of years. You can read it here.
Other sustainable aviation stories
Hybrid Air Vehicles is crowdfunding, the British airship developer says this is going to be the last opportunity to participate in a funding round of this nature. If you are curious, here is the link to Crowdcube.
Iberia has launched its Innovation Hub, which is a platform to channel its collaboration with startups from across the aerospace value chain. Sustainability is one of the main themes, but there are also sections for other areas of technology, such as artificial intelligence, automation and security. It is also part of the broader IAG innovation ecosystem.
What else in aviation?
Fascinating to see the trade war between the US and China unfold in real time. China Southern Airlines has decided to keep its B787-8 for now, since it appears that Chinese airlines will be unable to get new American planes for now.
Another airline that isn’t getting its Boeing planes soon is Air Astana, which has had to delay its long-awaited US route launch.
Here are some insights from my intervention at Aviation-Event 2025 CLJ talking with one of the global leaders in airport retail, Frédéric Chevalier, deputy CEO of Lagardere Travel Retail about the digitalization of the airport retail experience.
An insightful comparison between the GE90 engine which powers the B777 and the new generation GE9X, which will power the B777X.
A loose penguin provoked a helicopter crash. Yes, really!
Air France is introducing its luxurious La Première First Class on its New York-JFK route. Other destinations will follow suit.
A look at Rzeszow Airport, in southeastern Poland, which became the military and civilian gateway to Ukraine pretty much overnight in 2022.
Unum has unveiled the first two customers - Wamos and TAAG - for its new generation, minimalist business class seat.
Is Russia building an alternative to SpaceX Starlink?