Why do you say that? Typical fuel consumption values for passenger aircraft are 2.5-4 liters per 100km per passenger. So if you fly 1,000km, you'll use 25-40 liters of fuel. At current prices (around 60 cents per liter), that's $15-25 worth of fuel.
A liter of jet fuel contains 35-38 megajoules of energy, which is around 10 kilowatt-hours. Assuming 5% efficiency of using CO2, water, and cheap solar electricity (3 cents per kwh) to synthesize fuel, the cost of input energy per liter would be around 60 cents, which is the same as current fuel prices. The actual cost would be higher because you need to pay for the plant, workers, consumable catalysts, transporting the fuel to airports, etc. But real world efficiency would likely be higher than 5%. Also solar panels are still getting cheaper and more efficient, so 3 cents per kWh may be considered expensive in a decade.
Even without electric aircraft, there's no reason in principle why aviation needs to be expensive or bad for the environment. If demand for petroleum causes prices to increase enough, synthesized fuels will become economically competitive.
I believe that by 2050 synthetic hydrocarbons made from carbon dioxide and clean electricity will be deliverable at a real (inflation adjusted) cost less than than 3x current oil prices, on an equivalent-energy-content basis. That could more than double the costs of a transatlantic flight, but still wouldn't price it out of reach of the upper middle class.
Synthetic methanol made with renewable energy has already been commercialized on a modest scale:
At 10-15% conversion efficiency, you're burning 85-90% of your energy just making the damn fuel, requiring 6-7× more renewable infrastructure than direct electrification. Current production costs are $15-25/gallon (not the fairy tale $2-3/gallon of jet fuel), and the physics won't magically improve to hit their "3× oil prices by 2050" fantasy. To replace global aviation fuel would demand a staggering 32,000 TWh of new clean energy generation – that's roughly equivalent to building 900 nuclear plants just to make luxury jet fuel while the rest of the grid still burns coal.
Just build more nuclear power plants. There’s absolutely no reason why modern civilization still needs to rely so heavily on hydrocarbons. Unlimited electric energy, with a electrified rail network, public transportation and EVs for commuting, should take care of most use cases, except maybe a few where the energy density doesn’t make sense.
And don’t even get me started with the “our grid cannot handle it” nonsense. If it cannot, then make it so that it can. When this country started off, we didn’t say “our roads cannot handle the cars”, instead we built them, quite a lot of them. We can do that again.
Actual comprehensive high speed rail networks would reduce the overall carbon footprint of travel by a huge factor, while still permitting a high overall degree of affordable mobility.
I think most of the public would choose the second option. And this is a 500km long trip. Anything longer, and planes win by even larger margin.
If you're talking about the US, there's more about its rail networks density than unwillingness of Americans to build new railroads. It's also because people... don't really like using trains for long-distance transit?
Chill, biofuels or gas synthesis will be fine and carbon neutral for big jets. Once solar or fusion produces the primary power cheaply the conversion loss isn't a huge deal.
I think we'll see the global rich (western middle class) continue to fly well past the onset of the famines and refugee waves.
Without a single family detached house and a regular vacation flight most "middle class" people would have no idea why to get up in the morning. Our whole culture is built around lauding and striving toward that pattern as the good life. It will have to be taken from them, they will not give it up willingly.
People drive to work anyway. A vacation or two every year is probably not even a double digit percent of a person’s total fossil fuel usage, and gives them a lot of happiness and reason to work and do things that are good for society.
ggreer|10 months ago
A liter of jet fuel contains 35-38 megajoules of energy, which is around 10 kilowatt-hours. Assuming 5% efficiency of using CO2, water, and cheap solar electricity (3 cents per kwh) to synthesize fuel, the cost of input energy per liter would be around 60 cents, which is the same as current fuel prices. The actual cost would be higher because you need to pay for the plant, workers, consumable catalysts, transporting the fuel to airports, etc. But real world efficiency would likely be higher than 5%. Also solar panels are still getting cheaper and more efficient, so 3 cents per kWh may be considered expensive in a decade.
Even without electric aircraft, there's no reason in principle why aviation needs to be expensive or bad for the environment. If demand for petroleum causes prices to increase enough, synthesized fuels will become economically competitive.
philipkglass|10 months ago
Synthetic methanol made with renewable energy has already been commercialized on a modest scale:
https://carbonrecycling.com/technology
Methanol can be reformed to kerosene as a drop-in replacement for oil derived jet fuel:
"Fischer-Tropsch & Methanol-based Kerosene"
https://aireg.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/airegWebinar_FT_...
kumarski|10 months ago
darth_avocado|10 months ago
And don’t even get me started with the “our grid cannot handle it” nonsense. If it cannot, then make it so that it can. When this country started off, we didn’t say “our roads cannot handle the cars”, instead we built them, quite a lot of them. We can do that again.
lukev|10 months ago
AndriyKunitsyn|10 months ago
https://eurorails.com/en/trains/amsterdam-centraal/paris?dat...
A similar one-way ticket for the same date for a flight costs $112 (with no bags), and it takes 1 hour 25 minutes.
https://www.kiwi.com/en/search/results/amsterdam-netherlands... (Yes, some people can say that Kiwi is a shady website, but it can find some good deals if used right.)
I think most of the public would choose the second option. And this is a 500km long trip. Anything longer, and planes win by even larger margin.
If you're talking about the US, there's more about its rail networks density than unwillingness of Americans to build new railroads. It's also because people... don't really like using trains for long-distance transit?
kumarski|10 months ago
:(
bpodgursky|10 months ago
cagenut|10 months ago
Without a single family detached house and a regular vacation flight most "middle class" people would have no idea why to get up in the morning. Our whole culture is built around lauding and striving toward that pattern as the good life. It will have to be taken from them, they will not give it up willingly.
generalizations|10 months ago
Be careful when advocating force towards others. Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent, after all.
kumarski|10 months ago
sadhorse|10 months ago
epicureanideal|10 months ago
Also: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_economy_in_aircraft
linotype|10 months ago