In conversation - Matthias Niederhäuser - Sustainability in the Air

November 25, 2022

Imagine if you could pilot a single-engine aeroplane around the world. What if you could do it with a close friend?

Even better, what if you could do it on sustainable aviation fuel? That’s exactly what our latest guest on the podcast did this year.

In this episode of our ‘Sustainability in the Air’ podcast, Matthias Niederhäuser, Pilot and Partner at Diamondo Earthrounding, speaks with SimpliFlying CEO, Shashank Nigam.

Diamondo Earthrounding is a non-profit organisation based in Switzerland which connects and promotes numerous initiatives accelerating aviation’s path into a more sustainable future.

Their aim is to create further awareness for sustainable technologies and promote ways for investing into them to accelerate aviation’s path to net-zero carbon emissions.

Here are some of the areas that Matthias and Shashank discussed:

Why he wanted to fly around the world on SAF
Facing the critics
What it took to prepare for the mission
Covid-related challenges
Flight-shaming experience
SAF: How it was sourced throughout the expedition
Book and Claim explained
The cost of SAF for the journey
SAF subsidies
Flying CO2 neutral
Green hydrogen
Flying across the Pacific in a single-engine aircraft
Scaling sustainability without harming the planet
Gaining traction on SAF: galvanising support
The cost of the mission and key learnings

Listen to the episode here or on your favourite podcast platform.
Together with our season partner CarbonClick, we plant one tree for every new listener and 50 trees for each review. All funds will go to the Maputo Bay Reforestation Initiative in southern Mozambique.

The Travel Smart Scheme and why it matters

Much of the noise and visible public pressure against airlines comes from climate change activists.

But at the same time, something perhaps even more impactful is happening under the radar: Corporates are starting to curb business travel in response to sustainability concerns.

This is a trend that we’ve been tracking since before COVID.

Last year, the World Economic Forum published a study saying that “only” 25% of businesses listed the environment as a top priority when it comes to their corporate travel programme.

But one in four businesses is actually quite significant and could represent tens of thousands of seats, and that number will only go up.

This comes as Brussels-based lobby group Transport & Environment earlier this year teamed up with American NGO Stand. Earth to launch a campaign called “Travel Smart”. The goal is to encourage businesses to cut staff travel to 50% of pre-COVID levels by 2025.

In our latest blog post, we look at Travel Smart and talk about why initiatives such as this matter.

Deal news

Etihad Airways becomes first airline to participate in World Energy’s net-zero program (Gulf Business)