Whole Travel Blog

Thursday, Continental Airlines announced the results of its January 7 biofuel demonstration flight. Not only was the flight successful, the biofuel showed approximately 1.1% greater fuel efficiency over traditional jet fuel. So, not only was the fuel made from renewable sources, it actually beat traditional fuel outright. This type of fuel is estimated to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 60-80% as well.

Flying the greener skies

“We look forward to working with our partners as biofuels go through the certification process, and we hope to see these fuels proceed into commercial quantities in the near future,” said Leah Raney, Continental’s managing director of global environmental affairs. Hopefully it’s not long until we see all jet fuel from sustainable sources.

Finding alternatives to plastic has been difficult at best over the past few decades. The problem is that oil is traditionally derived from oil, which both consumes fossil fuels and produces greenhouse gases. Recently, however, scientists at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory announced a simple process that turns cellulose (plant fibers) into plastic.

Making Plastic From Plants 101

While this process is still quite a ways off from commercial application, it shows promise as a way of creating alternative plastics. With so many of today’s products packaged in some form of plastic, finding a sustainable way to replace our fossil fuel-derived types would have a large impact on the environment, both consumption of fossil fuels and emission of greenhouse gases.