When people debate air pollution in Southern California, images of the usual suspects arise — trucks belching diesel fumes, aging jalopies not yet snagged by the smog-testing authorities and smokestacks towering over refineries and other heavy industry.
But often overlooked is another contributor: jetliners and other aircraft.
While commercial air travel’s contribution to pollution — 12 percent of all greenhouse gases from transportation — is dwarfed by the emissions generated by earthbound vehicles, air-quality advocates say the impact is still worrisome and that the industry hasn’t kept pace with pollution-reducing efforts of other industries. Buoying their concern:
• Recent reports reveal increased levels of particulate matter — unhealthful emissions that contribute to smog — from aircraft.
• Pollution regulations that have been a staple for land-trekking vehicles for years are just beginning to take hold for aircraft because of the complex tangle of international regulation and the myriad governments and agencies involved.
• The legacy issue endures of thousands of piston-engine planes taking off from smaller airports, many still spewing lead from their exhaust. Research has linked lead exposure to the disruption of development of the brain and nervous system in children.
The Federal Aviation Administration and airlines contend they are working diligently to reduce skyward pollutants.
Officials look to recent historic international accords, aimed at controlling C02 and greenhouse gases produced by aircraft, to help lead the way.
And the FAA and airline officials say they’re bullish on long-term goals of reducing carbon pollution linked to climate change and investing millions of dollars in research and development of cleaner-burning fuels.
“We are taking steps to protect the planet,” said Natalie Mindrum a United Airlines executive charged with the company’s environmental strategy.
Meanwhile, the Environmental Protection Agency is researching whether lead emitted from piston engines attains a level that poses a public health danger, a move that eventually could lead to tighter air- quality regulations on the small aircraft.
For some, progress isn’t coming fast enough.
“As trucks and vehicles get cleaner, the impact from aviation gets larger,” said Scott Fruin, an assistant professor of research preventive medicine at USC.
Soaring business
Critics say the urgency to deal with the issue intensifies each year. Why? Air travel is booming.
The FAA estimates 5,000 flights are in the air at any given time, and demand for air travel is expected to increase 1.9 percent a year over the next 20 years.
The industry accounts for 5 percent of the country’s gross domestic product. And its influence across the globe is only expected to skyrocket as household incomes increase.
The Southern California basin — already the nation’s busiest airspace — is home to four international airports:
• The mammoth Los Angeles International Airport is in the midst of another multibillion-dollar growth plan.
• John Wayne is the sole commercial airport serving Orange County’s 3 million residents.
• Newly independent Ontario is aiming for rekindled passenger popularity after years in LAX’s shadow while managed by Los Angeles World Airports.
• San Bernardino — primarily a maintenance, repair and overhaul facility on the grounds of the long-closed Norton Air Force Base — has yet to establish a passenger business. But if Mexican airline Volaris gets its way, flights between the SBD and Guadalajara could start in November.
And nearly a dozen smaller regional and municipal airports — many of them percolating with commercial travelers, such as Hollywood-Burbank and Long Beach — add to the air traffic.
Getting a free ride?
USC’s Fruin is at the leading edge of research on the environmental impacts of aviation. He is one of a handful of researchers who in 2014 published a groundbreaking study that found concentrations of ultrafine particulate matter near LAX at levels higher than those near some freeways — a major source of pollution.
“Because of their international nature, there has been so little regulation and progress,” Fruin said. “Some say that airlines have gotten a free ride.”
Particulate matter poses a health risk because it can get trapped inside the respiratory system. It has been linked to asthma, lung damage and other health aliments.
Fruin’s study found concentrations of ultrafine particles more than doubled over 20 square miles around the airport, compared with levels in communities farther away. The smaller the matter, the easier it can escape into the bloodstream.
As a follow-up, Fruin and other researchers have begun to look at the health effects around airports,.
LAX has no authority to regulate aircraft emissions but has implemented its own plans requiring ground vehicles to reduce pollution. Last year, nine electrical units were installed so operators could power up near the gates where aircraft taxi instead of relying on dirty-burning diesel units, a recipe for pollution.
Cracking down on emissions
Fruin’s latest investigation comes as the International Civil Aviation Organization, a Montreal-based body of the United Nations that creates global airline standards, is developing guidelines for particulate-matter emission levels.
The group already has struck a landmark international accord to cut international flyers’ greenhouse-gas pollution. International passenger and cargo flights generate about 10,000 tons of greenhouse gases each year.
The ICAO’s sweeping climate-change plan calls for a scenario, much like California’s cap-and-trade program, that would allow airlines to offset their emissions by allowing them to purchase credits for earth-friendly projects around the world.
Backed by the United States and China, the effort would begin in 2021. It will be voluntary until 2027, when it would become mandatory.
The agreement built on the success of ICAO’s earlier triumph, winning approval of CO2-emissions design standards for all new commercial planes.
The accord came alongside the Paris climate agreement, embraced by former President Barack Obama but spurned by President Donald Trump earlier this year.
After the signing, Olumuyiwa Bernard Aliu, head of the ICAO, said the agency could now “claim its ‘Paris moment.’ ”
The goal is to limit carbon pollution to 2020 levels.
“It’s a significant deal because its the first time a whole global sector would have a limit on carbon dioxide. Is it enough? No,” said Annie Petsnok, an attorney with Environmental Defense Fund.
Fighting climate change with fuels
Earlier this year, a draft report created by 13 agencies found the United States is already beginning to see the impacts of climate change, with more heat waves, heavy rains and other extreme weather. Some point to recent mammoth storms — such as Hurricane Harvey, which wreaked historic havoc in Texas last week — as supporting evidence.
As aviation continues to grow, the harsh spotlight on carbon emissions will likely intensify, said Anastasia Kharina, a researcher at the International Council on Clean Transportation.
If nothing is done to change aircraft emissions, Kharina estimates carbon pollutants from planes could triple by 2050.
Scientists fear the cocktail of chemicals released by airplanes in the sky is more dangerous than pollutants released on the ground because they interact more directly with the earth’s atmosphere, said Ralph Cavalieri, former director of the Aviation Sustainablity Center, a government-funded research organization led by Washington State University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
But recent progress can be found.
To reduce their clients’ costs, manufacturers have created more efficient engines and lighter aircraft — cutting flight times, saving fuel and mitigating pollution.
But, Cavalieri said, “There’s only so much you can accomplish from engine improvement, light-weighting of airplanes and operational improvements. All the rest has to be done with alternative fuels.”
Commercial airlines began using less polluting biofuels in 2011, refined from such substances as natural oils and agricultural wastes.
The new fuels are mixed with traditional petroleum-based fuels, creating a blend that helps reduce carbon emissions.
Last March, LAX and United Airlines became the first U.S. airline and airport to begin flying planes supplied with biofuels that generate 60 percent less planet-warming carbon exhaust. About 1,000 flights use the blended fuels.
“We think it’s a good move forward in controlling emissions,” said Mindrum, director of environmental strategy and sustainability for Chicago-based United Airlines.
But while her company has invested heavily in the emerging industry, Mindrum said there’s simply not enough fuel produced yet.
United holds a three-year contract with Paramount-based Altair Fuels to produce 15 million gallons of blended biofuels. In 2015, the airline invested $30 million in California-based Fulcrum BioEnergy, which specializes in turning household garbage into aviation biofuel.
Under their agreement, United and Fulcrum could create up to five production facilities around the air carriers. They would pump out an additional 180 million gallons of fuel per year.
Such steps stoke optimism in the industry, which says it’s not all altruism. It’s also marketplace demand.
“This is something,” Mindrum said, “that our customers and stakeholders at the airports want.”
