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I imagine that at capacity, they can just as efficient as larger jets (if not more efficient). There may be a sweet spot in terms of efficiency that can be achi
by amscanne 4y ago
I imagine that at capacity, they can just as efficient as larger jets (if not more efficient). There may be a sweet spot in terms of efficiency that can be achieved that is smaller than what we've got now. We've already seen jumbo jets fall out of favor, and e.g. this can be seen in the sales of the A380 and 787 (launched around the same big, with A380 going big, and 787 going efficient and mid-sized with about 10x the sales). I imagine that planes would get smaller still, but the reason they don't is that even with high oil prices, human costs still tend to dominate the cost of a flight (two pilots, cabin crew). It's not so hard to imagine that with more automation it will become viable to have much smaller, more frequent routes that are both more economically and environmentally efficient.
- nawgz 4y agoJetliners have an industry average 51mpg per passenger. Private learjets pull, at capacity, 28mpg per passenger. I’ll let you decide which one of these flies around more often at lower percentages of capacity.
- nickff 4y agoLearjet was a brand name (used to be an independent company founded by Bill Lear), which is no longer active (after having been acquired and subsequently discontinued). The more generic terms are 'general aviation' and 'business aviation'; most small jets are 'business jets'.
- nawgz 4y agoI am citing specific statistics for a specific and popular private jet, as these things are not well analyzed for not surprising reasons. Feel free to prove the point with statistics, semantics are definitely an aside to the point at hand
- nickff 4y agoYou're comparing obsolete small jets to a much newer fleet of commercial passenger aircraft. While business jets do tend to be older, your choice is rather extreme, and introduces a huge bias. This website has some interesting examples of more modern aircraft in a few categories: https://www.flyingmag.com/the-most-fuel-efficient-aircraft-in-several-categories/ https://www.flyingmag.com/the-most-fuel-efficient-aircraft-i...
- nawgz 4y agoA bunch of 4mpg 7-8 seaters align perfectly with my criticism of private jets. Actually, I don’t really understand what leads you to think there is any pressure in this space for fuel efficient development. In the space of jetliners, the airlines optimize for cost, of which fuel is a primary driver. While it is cool local planes pull 25mpg, they spew lead on their local communities. I don’t think humanity can put the cat of air travel back in the bag, and if I understand correctly the SUV market is actually driving as much CO2 emissions as the entirety of aviation; I still don’t see why individuals should be privileged to do such damage of poison and inefficiency for their pleasure. It is pleasing to others to imagine a long lived humanity on a globe hosting life as we know it, after all.
- amscanne 4y agoObviously the private jet industry optimizes more for comfort and other things before efficiency today. The commercial aviation industry does optimize for efficiency but only with larger planes since human costs (and airport costs) are mostly fixed per plane. I’m simply saying that perhaps the future could have smaller, more efficient planes and more automation that removes fixed costs. (The design in the article is such a plane, in theory.) You seem to be conflating big/small with commercial/private and taking a firm anti-private position.