ForeFlight to Collaborate with Breakthrough Energy on Contrail Avoidance

ForeFlight, a Boeing company, announced a collaboration with Breakthrough Energy (BE), a global climate and clean energy group, at the European Business Aviation Convention & Exhibition (EBACE). This joint effort aims to equip business aviation operators like Luxaviation with advanced tools to avoid contrails and thereby reduce their environmental impact.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) recently published a report that concluded contrails account for about 35% of aviation’s global warming impact. Contrails form behind aircraft when hot, humid exhaust mixes with colder air at high altitudes, causing water vapor to condense and freeze into ice crystals.

ForeFlight is working with BE to explore how its software tools – which analyze weather forecasts, satellite imagery and other data to model and detect contrails – can help business aviation operators lessen their environmental impact.

“Our initial plan is to begin offering ways for operators to visualize areas of possible contrail formation in ForeFlight Dispatch,” said Henrik Hansen, ForeFlight’s Chief Technology Officer. “Dispatchers at Luxaviation and elsewhere using ForeFlight already have access to our most powerful flight planning tools to help pilots avoid turbulence, icing and storms. So, the seemingly next step is surfacing areas where contrails could be created. As the research continues to evolve, we’re excited to explore new and innovative ways to integrate the models and data produced by Breakthrough Energy.”

Breakthrough Energy says that slightly changing the route of five percent of flights could eliminate most contrails-inducing warming.

“By expanding our efforts into contrail avoidance with ForeFlight, Breakthrough Energy is demonstrating that innovative collaboration is key to reducing aviation’s climate impact,” said Matteo Mirolo, Head of Contrails Policy and Strategy at BE. “Working with ForeFlight is an important step to reaching more aviation operators around the world. We look forward to continuing to find ways to put this useful information in front of pilots and to meaningfully mitigate warming contrails.”

Luxaviation takes a holistic approach to sustainability, supporting technologies that enable the visibility, management and mitigation of aviation’s nuanced environmental impacts, including those derived from non-CO2 components. As Patrick Hansen, CEO, Luxaviation Group explains: “We consider corporate sustainability as an integral part of our business strategy and integrate sustainability into our decision-making processes.”

“Our Group has been an early supporter of the ForeFlight story. We are proud to be a strategic partner and support its ongoing development. ForeFlight provides an exceptional solution and continuously improves its features, providing situational awareness and an added layer of safety for our operations around the world,” stresses Robert Fisch, Chief Aviation Officer, Luxaviation Group.

“We’re excited to work with Breakthrough Energy and Luxaviation on this incredibly complex and important topic,” said Tim Schuetze, CEO of ForeFlight. “Our flight planning tools are built to make flying more efficient and cost-effective than ever. Partnering with organizations like Breakthrough Energy will not only help pilots make better decisions but also lead us to a more sustainable future for aviation. In addition, our ability to seamlessly put an important tool like this into the hands of operators is unparalleled as more and more companies adopt ForeFlight around the world.”