On Wednesday afternoon at 3:25 p.m., the first plane fueled with 40 percent sustainable fuel took off from Aalborg Airport. This was announced by Norwegian, which operates the new domestic route between Aalborg and Copenhagen.
Denmark is the first country in Europe to have a domestic flight route with 40 percent of the so-called SAF - sustainable fuel - in the tank. The route from Aalborg to Copenhagen was created as part of the government's plan "Green Aviation in Denmark".
Sara Neergaard, country manager for Norwegian in Denmark, has called it a "step in the right direction". But Norwegian does not call the new route "green".
- As long as we still have fossil fuel in the tank, it is de facto not green. It is clearly more sustainable than it was before. But when it is not possible to fly on 100 percent SAF, we as a commercial airline cannot market it as green, Sara Neergaard told Ritzau.
The raw material - typically used cooking oil - comes from European cities and is converted into fuel in Gothenburg, after which it is flown to Aalborg Airport.
The fuel includes palm oil, which is often associated with the clearing of large areas of rainforest for use in production.
The Council for Green Transition calls for other fuel solutions
At the environmental organization Council for Green Transition, advisor for green transport Alexander Bjørn Hansen has said that they support all initiatives that can reduce CO2 emissions from aviation.
- But the money could perhaps have been spent more sensibly on the Danish side. The fuel that is coming into the tanks now comes primarily from used cooking oil. And there is a limited amount of that. So we need to have some other types of fuels on the road.
SAF (Sustainable Aviation Fuel) can also be created using green electricity and hydrogen - the so-called eFuels.
And it would be better to spend the money on developing this in Denmark, according to the Council for Green Transition and the rest of the Climate Partnership for Aviation, which consists of a number of companies within aviation and green energy, among other things.
Jannick Schmidt, a professor of sustainability at Aalborg University, tells DR that the green part of the fuel is not produced in a sustainable way.
- The fuel is based on residual products. So in the long run it is a very bad idea, he tells DR.
The new solution could therefore be worse if one does not think further ahead and move from the consumption of residual products to "climate-neutral fuel that can completely reduce greenhouse gases", says Jannick Schmidt to DR.
International regulations currently allow flying with a maximum of 50 percent green fuel for safety reasons.
/ritzau/
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