Google And American Airlines Use AI To Contrail Climate Change

Google, American Airlines, and Microsoft founder Bill Gates ‘ company Breakthrough Energy are now working together to combat aviation’s impact on global warming. The aim is to avoid contrails.

Measures against climate change

Contrails are not only a hot topic among conspiracy theorists (keyword “chemtrails”) but also in the fight against climate change.

The contrails have an impact on global warming and are therefore a problem that has been studied by scientists for a long time. Contrails form when moisture condenses around particles emitted by aircraft, which can cause heat to build up in the atmosphere.

Artificial intelligence helps with route calculation

Google, American Airlines, and Breakthrough Energy have now implemented an idea using AI and available weather data to reduce the formation of contrails The Verge reports.

Using satellite imagery and artificial intelligence to predict and avoid contrails appears to be a promising approach to mitigating their impact: the project aims to inform pilots in real time where contrails are likely to form, allowing them to plan their flight paths and altitudes can be adjusted to minimize the impact.

This promises a significant reduction in the carbon footprint of the aviation industry. American Airlines conducted test flights using contrail prediction maps developed by Google and Breakthrough Energy.

The pilots completed 70 test flights over a period of six months and found the maps easy and intuitive. The first results are promising.

During the test flights, in which contrails were “flown around”, these were reduced by 54 percent. A little more fuel (2 percent) was used due to the adjustments to the flight routes, but this could also be improved. The research is currently still at an early stage, now it is a matter of carrying out studies and tests in order to plan the implementation on a larger scale.