Austrian Airlines, a subsidiary of Germany’s Lufthansa, can no longer advertise that flying can be “CO2 neutral”. An Austrian court has ruled that.

In turn, Carsten Spohr, Lufthansa’s CEO, has hinted that his airline would have to consume half of Germany’s electricity production for its entire fleet to fly on e-fuels.

According to the French weekly financial newspaper La Tribune, Spohr advocates producing this energy outside the country, where wind or solar energy is available in unlimited quantities.

Misleading campaign

An Austrian consumer organization went to court last year after the airline allowed travelers to choose sustainable jet fuel for their flight to Venice. The fuel was made from recycled frying fat.

But statements about it wrongly gave the impression that the special fuel would make the flights climate-neutral, the consumer organization said. A court in Korneuburg followed suit.

Due to technical reasons, the airline failed to mention that only a maximum of 5% renewable fuel can be added and that Austrian Airlines uses only 0,4% renewable fuel. Nor did the advertisement show that choosing recycled fuel would increase the ticket price by more than half.

Austrian Airlines did not have to pay a fine but had to make the court ruling public.

E-fuels needed

As for Lufthansa’s problem, the European Parliament adopted a European regulation called RefuelEU Aviation in mid-September. That new regulation means that from 2025, flights in Europe and departing from European airports must incorporate, on average, 2% of Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAF) in the kerosene.

That percentage gradually increases every five years to achieve a final objective of 70% incorporation in 2050. But from 2030, it will also have to include a portion of synthetic fuels or e-fuels. It will be 1,2% in 2030, then 5% in 2035, to reach 35% in 2050.

If this trajectory is respected, these e-fuels, produced from CO2 captured in the air or industrial fumes and hydrogen, represent half of European SAF fuels.

Not enough green electricity in Germany

But making these e-fuels requires a large amount of green electricity, which is currently unavailable in Germany. According to Lufthansa CEO Carsten Spohr, his fleet would need around half of Germany’s electricity to convert into e-fuel, an amount the Federal Network Agency does not want to give him.

Furthermore, Germany does not currently have a large amount of green electricity. Consequently, it seems logical for the CEO to produce these e-fuels abroad, where wind or solar energy is available in practically unlimited quantities.

Many challenges

The fact remains that, for many, e-fuels are only a transitional technology: planes flying on hydrogen are the future for the decarbonization of the aircraft sector. The first hydrogen-powered aircraft, probably for short-distance routes, is foreseen for somewhere between 2025 and 2030, and Airbus has plans to launch the first commercial hydrogen-powered aircraft by 2035.

But the engineering challenges for hydrogen, which can get you to the point where you have zero carbon emissions, are significant. Hydrogen as a gas is too voluminous to be stored in useful quantities on board an airplane, so it must be cooled to -253°C, the temperature at which hydrogen condenses into a liquid.

Furthermore, airports must be re-equipped to allow planes to fly on hydrogen. So, airports worldwide need to build cryogenic infrastructure for fueling and storage, and the question is, who will pay for it?

Or to say it in the words of Willie Walsh, director general of the International Air Transport Association (IATA): “I think hydrogen will undoubtedly be a long-term solution for an alternative fuel, but there are still many challenges to resolve to get there.”