Author: Professor Rafael Palacios
The UK is one of five countries in the world with the capability to build its own aeroplanes. As an island nation we rely on aerospace more than other countries. So aviation technology here has always developed at pace. We have the third largest sector in the OECD by market share, after the US and France and a healthy pipeline of startup ranging from nanosatellites to large lighter-than-air vehicles. And the operations of companies like Rolls Royce, BAE Systems and Airbus stand as symbols of the sector’s future potential.
The pressure to accelerate development in aviation
Today, the defining challenge for the industry is net zero and producing the technical solutions and new business models to make net zero flight a reality in the second half of this century. There is no realistic future without flight. So the aviation industry is under enormous pressure to accelerate the development of sustainable fuels and more fuel-efficient aeroplanes, and to ramp up investment to support the pace of technological progress.
Transitioning to net zero will also mean defining new ways of working. To electrify road transport, consumers must shift their perspective to buy electric cars. But the way fleets are financed in aviation is business-to-business and much more complex. So transitioning to net zero flight will only happen if the UK government intervenes positively, introducing the economic incentives to create new business models, with companies reacting to that policy environment.
Aerospace regulation can drive growth and competition
In other words, the way to reduce the environmental impact of aviation is regulation. It cannot be left to the market. The UK’s Aerospace Technology Institute and industry-led Jet Zero strategy demonstrate that both government and business accept this. Defining a regulatory pathway to net zero is a key focus of work supported by the Centre for Sectoral Economic Performance, with policy recommendations that will help drive economic growth and competitiveness in the UK’s aerospace industry.[1]
Britain can make major gains in aerospace
We can be confident that the UK can make major gains in the sector in the coming decades. Aerospace engineering and innovation in the UK is thriving, whether it’s the Wing of Tomorrow made at Airbus or Rolls Royce producing the largest ever jet engine.
The UK is also pioneering new types of air travel, such as battery-powered air taxis. Imagine hopping on an air taxi from Heathrow to Gatwick to make a connecting flight or to finish your journey on the right side of London, avoiding road traffic and emissions. Vertical Airspace in Bristol is working on making that journey a reality.
Working towards new forms of sustainable aviation
The UK is rich with innovation in this area. Last November saw the flight100 project led by Virgin Atlantic, where a team of experts from Imperial and the University of Sheffield analysed a flight from London to New York to see if sustainable aviation fuel can be used with existing infrastructure while reducing carbon emissions. For these larger aircraft, it’s likely we will need to combine hydrogen with CO2 obtained from carbon capture to make e-fuels, a new form of sustainable aviation fuel.
These fuels are still very expensive, and in the medium-term we expect these fuels to be produced from biomass. Meanwhile, as we move to a hydrogen economy for uses where electric power is not possible, companies including ZeroAvia are developing hydrogen propulsion for smaller aircraft used in regional aviation. Given the UK’s expertise in AI and data science, we also need to see more innovative work applying these capabilities to accelerate development.
Partnership is essential for progress
There are also some areas with exciting potential, like the work Google and American Airlines have done to show that flying slightly different routes can reduce the climate impact of contrails. These trap large amounts of heat that would otherwise have left the earth’s atmosphere, and which might account for up to 35% of aviation’s global warming impact. Satellite analysis found the experiment reduced contrails by 54%, while only burning 2% more fuel.
We need to see more of this kind of strong partnership between academia, industry, government and finance. Our report will also show how we can put the right policy mechanisms in place to support this collaboration, from R&D and net zero to the business environment and access to investment. In the coming decade we have a golden opportunity to build, protect and capitalise on the UK’s aerospace capabilities. But we will only do this if we have a clear direction, informed by this research.
Professor Rafael Palacios is Director of The Brahmal Vasudevan Institute for Sustainable Aviation, a collaborative research centre at Imperial College for blue-sky thinking towards environmentally friendly aviation. He is a Professor in Computational Aeroelasticity as Deputy Head of the Department of Aeronautics in the Faculty of Engineering. He has been a consultant for Facebook and Airbus in the design of solar-powered aircraft. He is an Associate Fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and a Fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society.
The Centre for Sectoral Economic Performance at Imperial College London investigates how to improve the competitiveness of the UK economy and drive economic growth. It is a joint initiative between Imperial’s Faculty of Engineering and the Imperial College Business School, bringing together the UK’s top engineers, scientists and economists with the UK’s science and technology industries to co-design globally competitive strategies for major global challenges such as net zero.
[1] https://www.imperial.ac.uk/sectoral-economic-performance/