Australia to pioneer "green flight" network

Australia's air traffic control operator yesterday announced plans for a new nationwide system of flight navigation that promises to slash annual carbon emissions by 122 million tones, while saving airlines 39 million kilograms of fuel a year.

The plans were unveiled at a meeting of the Civil Air Navigation Services Organisation Annual General Meeting in San Diego, California, where Airservices Australia confirmed it had signed a major deal with navigation systems provider Naverus to roll out the world's first nationwide Performance-based Navigation (PBN) network.

Under the deal, Airservices Australia and Naverus are to implement so-called Required Navigation Performance (RNP) procedures at up to 28 major airports around Australia over the next five years.

RNP works by requiring planes to meet a certain level of performance before they can fly a route and then monitoring the achieved performance and providing automatic alerts if the aircraft fails to meet the agreed specifications. Aircraft equipped with RNP systems can then safely operate on routes with less separation, leading to fewer fuel wasting delays at busy airports.

RNP systems are also typically used to support Continuous Descent Approaches, which similarly improve fuel efficiency and cut carbon emissions and noise levels.

Airservices chief executive Greg Russell said the new procedures would " deliver benefits to the aviation industry and the community through improvements in aviation safety and efficiency and environmental impact".

He added that the systems and procedures had already been successfully trialled by Australian airline Quantas at Brisbane Airport, where they resulted in average savings per flight of 125kg of fuel and 390kg of CO2, while also reducing flight times by over two and a half minutes.