'Magical thinking': hopes for sustainable jet fuel not realistic, report finds
theguardian.com
theguardian.com
It's interesting to ponder what a world would look like where there just aren't aeroplanes.
No one has an answer to that question, at present (in terms of solutions that work at scale, and without unsustainable secondary effects).
Which brings us back to the subject of the article -- magical thinking.
After that long list of low hanging fruit has been done, then we'll need to industrialize those other options. For now, they're very much in the research phase.
I'm quite bullish about e-fuels personally but even if those never pan out, we have options.
In other words - they just don't work at present.
Only in the sense that meets the standard of "why we've not already done it".
From the article itself, "Globally, flying accounts for about 2% of all emissions", so while this does need to get fixed, it's nowhere near the top of the priority list.
But even then, one of the things near the end of the article is this:
> Large commercial airliners cannot be outfitted with batteries, unlike cars, due to their weight, while progress in other fuel forms, such as hydrogen, has been complicated.
Which is true.
But small aircraft account for a surprisingly high fraction of that 2%, and those can and are being outfitted with batteries.
But when it comes to the option of taxing CO2? That has two effects, one of which is to make all alternatives seem better, encouraging transition sooner; the other of which is that when we find ourselves struggling to do away with the last half a percent (or whatever) of current emissions, that small(!) scale is something that we do have suitable solutions for in terms of sequestration etc., even though it doesn't come close to the necessary level for current, much greater, emissions.
Medical analogy: you can't solve a broken bone with an aspirin tablet, but you probably do still want to use an aspirin for pain management at some point — it's not a panacea, but it's also not a placebo.