ZURICH - SWISS is to become the first passenger airline in the world to take advantage of the new AeroSHARK aircraft skin technology to further reduce the carbon dioxide emissions and the fuel consumption of its flight operations. All 12 of the airline’s Boeing 777-300ER aircraft will successively have the innovative riblet film, which has been co-developed by Lufthansa Technik and chemicals and coatings manufacturer BASF, applied to their fuselage and engine nacelles. The resulting significant reduction in aerodynamic drag will make the SWISS Boeing 777 fleet more than 1 percent more fuel efficient, and this in turn will substantially further reduce its carbon dioxide emissions. SWISS has also supported Lufthansa Technik and BASF in their development of the AeroSHARK film by measuring aircraft performance on its scheduled flights, AviationPros reports. Continue reading original article.
The Military & Aerospace Electronics take:
15 March 2022 -By applying a total of 950 square metrers of AeroSHARK riblet film to the fuselage and engine nacelle surfaces of a Boeing 777, fuel savings of some 1.1 percent can be achieved. This will reduce its annual fuel consumption by over 4,800 tonnes and the total annual carbon dioxide emissions of the SWISS Boeing 777 fleet by up to 15,200 tonnes – the amount emitted respectively by some 87 long-haul flights from Zurich to Mumbai.
“Reducing its environmental footprint is one of the greatest challenges ahead for the aviation sector, and being carbon-neutral in our flying by 2050 is a key SWISS strategic objective,” says SWISS CEO Dieter Vranckx. “We put a major emphasis at SWISS on actively promoting and making targeted investments in new technologies. And we’re delighted that, in becoming the world’s first passenger airline to use the innovative AeroSHARK technology, as we’ll be doing with our Boeing 777 fleet, we’ll now be making a further substantial contribution to ensuring more sustainable travel.”
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Jamie Whitney, Associate Editor
Intelligent Aerospace
