Virgin Atlantic to cut emissions

LONDON, England (CNN) -- Richard Branson's Virgin Atlantic will start trialling a new plan aimed at cutting aviation emissions by towing aircraft to take-off areas at London airports this month.

Some aircraft will be towed closer to the runway before takeoff at Heathrow and Gatwick airports in an effort to cut fuel burn by reducing the time engines are running before takeoff to about 10 minutes.

"Towing aircraft from a stand substantially reduces the amount of time they need to taxi with their engines running and reduces the time spent queuing before takeoff," a Virgin spokesman said in a statement.

Trials will take place at Heathrow and Gatwick using Boeing 747-400 planes, with a longer trial expected in the first quarter of 2007.

The airports' operator BAA, which is owned by Spain's Ferrovial, and British air traffic control authorities were working with Virgin on the trial.

Virgin was also talking to airports in San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York on similar trials.

Billionaire Branson, who owns half the airline (the other half being owned by Singapore Airlines), said earlier this year he would spend all the profits from his airline and rail businesses to combat global warming.

Airlines are coming under increasing pressure to cut emissions following a boom in air travel which has made aircraft one of the fastest-growing sources of greenhouse gases.

Isn't that taxi time good for, I dunno, silly stuff like making sure the engines are running properly? What about the emissions from the extra tugs, the extra tug drivers who will be driving to work, and the tug maintenance men who will be driving around more to fix the tugs due to being used more heavily?

Oh, and I'm pretty sure the environmental damage done by a single Virgin Galactic flight will be the equivalent of at least a dozen crossings of the pond by a 744.

Some of you might already know this, but I work for an environmental consulting firm and we advise huge corporations on how to cut their carbon emissions. This is actually huge news in working toward the advancement of cleaner aircraft.

Of course, if they are cutting emissions, they could start with Branson's mouth ;)