Emirates Airline Sustainability

The report analyses the sustainability condition of Emirates airline and proves that the company is sustainable with the help of Quantitative figures. The Sustainability in general defined as “meeting the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. The sustainability concept has been clearly demonstrated in the spherical diagram.

Source (http://www.vanderbilt.edu/sustainvu/who-we-are/what-is-sustainability/)

The enterprise if it has to be sustainable it has to balance these three forces i.e. social, Environment and economic. Emirates airline has been sustainable because of the measures taken by the company regarding Eco-Efficiency and environment practices reveals that they have sustainable approach in the business. The sustainability of the Emirates Airline Company has been proved in the report by Quantitative data’s from the environment factors of the company. The environmental factors depicts the airline concentrates its focus to promote sustainability in the surrounding environment of the Earth.

LITERATURE REVIEW:

The report focus on the sustainability of the airline company, the literature quotes of Guy Dauncey defines that “Sustainability is a condition of existence which enables the present generation of humans and other species to enjoy social wellbeing, a vibrant economy, and a healthy environment, and to experience fulfillment, beauty and joy, without compromising the ability of future generations of humans and other species to enjoy the same” (Guy Dauncey). The statement is valuable for the Airline Company to focus on sustainable structures to promote the greener bio-diversity for the future generation’s life existence on the planet.

The words on sustainable development by Brundtland “Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”

It contains within it two key concepts “The concept of needs, in particular the essential needs of the world’s poor, to which overriding priority should be given”

“The idea of limitations imposed by the state of technology and social organization on the environment’s ability to meet present and future needs”

The enterprise in general has to lead their business in sustainable manner for wellbeing of the society and people. The welfare of the people lives and environment for the future has to be promoted by every enterprises business strategy. The future of the environment depends on the present eco-system cycle, if there is an imbalance occurs it results in destruction of the environment. So the enterprises has to concentrate on sustainability

SUSTAINABILITY INDICATORS:

The indicators mentioned in the tabular column are the sustainability indicators drawn from Air Transportation Association (ATA) and International Air Transportation Association (IATA). The ATA and IATA are committees responsible for maintaining sustainability in the Aviation sectors.The indicators which is taken by the report to prove Emirates Airline as a sustainable enterprise. The other sustainability drivers include corporate social responsibility of Airline industry.

ENVIRONMENTAL INDICATORS

ECONOMIC INDICATORS

SOCAIL INDICATORS

Fuel efficiency and emission reduction

Financial results

Human Capital,Safety to customers

Energy efficiency

Contribution to economic systems(i.e. Innovation)

Charitiable contribution

Recycling/waste minimization

Shareholders value

Education

Water conservation

Payments to government

Welfare programs

Aircrat Noise

Corporate Goverance

Social diversity

EMIRATES AIRLINES PROFILE:

The Emirates airline is one of the pioneers in Airline industry in Asia. The Emirates airline is a subsidiary of Emirates Group which is owned by the United Arab Emirates. The airline was started in 1985 in Dubai and has airline operations to 120 destinations in the world. The chairman of the Emirates is Ahmed bin Saeed AL-Maktoum and has more 140 aircrafts comprises of Boeing and Airbus in its fleet. The airline has more than 40,000 employees and comprises of international flights and Air cargo. The airline has an award winning in-flight services, in-flight entertainment and more 400 awards are given to Emirates airlines.

The Emirates airline is a company which concentrates on Eco-Environment practices in order to maintain sustainability with the environment and the usage of technologies like flextracks programme, iflex, and single engine taxiing and ground electric power to reduce burning of fuel and to minimize the carbon-di-oxide emission. The airline maintains sustainability by flying younger aircrafts and has an emission record of 25% less than the emission mentioned by International Air Transportation Association (IATA). The airline is enhanced with Wolgan Valley conservation resort and recycling efforts to maintain sustainability. The sustainability can be achieved by focusing on emission and fuel savings, air traffic control, supply chain and by recycling the wastes.

The corporate social responsibility of the Emirates includes the formation Non-profitable Emirates foundation to take of the children suffering from poverty from different locations around the world to maintain humanity. The company has funding to Africa for the welfare of the children and arranging water facilities to Bangladesh. The social works include Skyward miles offered to humanitarian doctors to help the patients suffering from AIDS in Africa countries. The welfare schemes include the foundation of renewable energy in the countries like Brazil and Tanzania.

Environment Indicators of Emirates Airline:

For the analysis the variables are taken from2010-2011 environment report of Emirates Group

Source (http://www.emirates.com/english/environment/environment.aspx)

Fuel efficiency:

Fuel efficiency of the aircrafts of Emirates Company on 2010-2011 is 4.12 Liters per 100 passenger kilometers. The fuel efficiency is 25 % higher than International Air Transport Association (IATA) standard of 5.4 Liters per 100 passenger kilometers. Fuel consumption of Emirates airline in 2010-2011 is 5,619,791 tones and it increase than 2010 because of the introduction of 10 newer aircrafts for flight operations. When compared to the airlines like Lufthansa and Cathay Pacific the Emirates has a fuel efficient flight operations this is because of the usage of younger fleet aircrafts in their flight operations which has a life time of 5-6 years.

Carbon-di-oxide Emission:

The Carbon-di-oxide emission for 2011 is 17,702,341 tonnes includes passenger and air cargo and the efficiency of Carbon-di-oxide is 101.83g of carbon-di-oxide per passenger kilometer. The Emission of carbon to the atmosphere is lower than the base line mentioned by IATA i.e.136.5 g per passenger kilometre and efficient than other pioneer airliner. The controlled emission is because of usage of aircrafts which has reinforced composite material in the fuselage layout which reduces the weight.

Measures taken by the company to reduce emissions:

To increase the fuel efficiency, the airline has introduced flexible programs called Iflex to reduce flying hours of the flight. The control of carbon emission has done by promoting younger Aircraft flights with life time of less than six years. The company has eight hangers to carry out maintenance and servicing of aircrafts. The over haul maintenance of the engines are done in calculated time interval to control exhaust gases to the atmosphere. The introduction of advanced engineered aircrafts like B777-8F and A350-XWB will be fuel efficient and well designed to compete the carbon emissions.

NOISE EMISSION:

The percentage of Noise emission of Emirates airlines is measured in decibel (db) a unit of sound waves measurement. The noise emission measurement from 2008 to 2011 are mentioned as -8.38%,-8.41%,-8.26%,-8.75% which is lesser than the level mentioned by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). The aircraft noise includes noise generated from the aircraft engines. The control measures taken by the company to minimize the effect of aircraft noise is by running performance checks of the engines and by inspection by the maintenance engineers.

RECYCLING OF WASTES:

The Emirates Airline focus on sustainability by recycling the wastes from the onboard wastes such as plastics, card boards, aluminum cans recyclable products. The materials are recycled and used in the flight to reduce the carbon footprint. The revenue of AED 1 million (US$ 272,500) has been obtained by recycling the wastes. The company has taken welfare measures to use eco-efficient and bio-degradable materials on flight operations to promote sustainability. The tabular column below shows the consumption of electricity, water by the employees (i.e.20,000 employees) and 38 commercial building in Dubai of Emirates Group to analyze for the sustainability of the company.

Emirates Group Buildings(2010-2011)

Water Consumption

(ML)

Waste consumption(MWh)

Waste Generation(Tonnes)

Commercial

2571

350,635

88,612

Staff Accommodation

2696

262,282

12,372

Total

5267

612,917

100,984

Control Measures of Emirates Airline on Environment:

The Environment policy of the Emirates airline focuses on developing sustainable and eco-efficiency in air and in the ground. The policy includes creation of ‘Emvironment’ program team to govern the eco-environment practices of the company. The environment policy includes creation specific policies relating to waste management, recycling, water consumption and sustainable ground transport system to promote sustainability. The company plans to use efficient aircrafts for long range flight operations. The corporate structure of the company has core value to use highly innovative technologies to promote safety and reliability to the customers.

Social Indicators of Emirates airline:

The social indicators of Emirates Airline focus on the charitable works by starting an Emirates foundation program in 2003 for the welfare of the society. One of the programs includes the introducing skywards miles for the Humanitarian doctors to help people affected by HIV in Africa. The foundation concentrates the areas like health, housing, food and education for the people in poverty. The foundation works include building hospitals in Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and India, supporting children in Dubai and building schools in Kenya, India and Bangladesh.

The company has also started Dubai desert conservation to conserve plants and animals in the desert. The foundation of Wolgan valley resort in Sydney Australia of 1600 hectares for promoting endangered species from extinct and more than 17,5000 indigenous trees have been planted for the welfare of the Eco-system. The community project of collecting the wastes in Dubai has been done every year by the Emirates data team to control pollution. The company also started projects like clean water production, rain water harvesting and bio digester in Tanzania. In Senegal and Brazil the company has started renewable power generations for the green ecosystem to these countries.

The Emirates Company has 57,000 employees from 163 countries and has a diverse workplace to motivate the workers with incentives and arranging extracurricular activities to have a involvement in their work. The employees are the members of the Emvironment programme to support the environment to attain sustainability. The employees are provided with skyward plans to create awareness to the society about sustainable environment

Economic indicators of Emirates Airline:

The economic indicators of the Emirates airline company comprises of financial results, innovation and technology, Employers strength and corporate governance.

Financial results for five years:

Years

2006-07

2007-08

2008-2009

2009-2010

2010-2011

Operating profit(AED million)

3,339

4,451

2,278

3,565

5,441

Profit Growth rate (in %)

–

33

(31)

6.78

62.95

The financial results indicates that the Emirates company is sustainable in their economic perspective which has been shown in the tabular column in that the operating profit increase gradually the decline in 2008-2009 is because of the Global recession and uncertainty in the large scale economy which affects Emirates airline market growth in 2008. But the company has overcome in the next fiscal year by starting a central hub in Dubai and open air policies formed by the Airline Company.

Employee’s strength:

The employee’s productivity of the Emirates airline rose by 5.7% 38,797 in 2010-2011 because of the development of the company in the airline industry. The growth in the employees increased from 36,652 to 38,797 from 2010-2011 is because of the purchase of new aircrafts from Airbus and Boeing manufactures. The human capital is an essential driver for the Emirates airlines for the profitable growth in the aviation market.

Innovation and Technology:

The Emirates airlines mainly focus on development of technology in the flight operations to promote sustainability tom the environment. The total aircrafts comprises of (Boeing 777,747 and Airbus A330, A340, A350 and A380) is 156 in that 15 aircrafts of A380 is in operations the aircraft uses advanced technology in the Fuselage to have composite structures and GP7000 engine has been designed to be Eco-efficient and to reduce the carbon-di-oxide to the environment. The Boeing 777 has also uses advanced technologies for maintaining sustainability so the company uses advanced innovative aircrafts to promote sustainability.

Corporate Governance:

The Emirates Airline is owned by Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum who is the controller of the Emirates group and the company is fully owned by Investment Corporation of Dubai. The Corporate values of the company include service excellence, innovation, people, financial strength and safety. The core value drives the company to position of pioneer in the airline industry. The core value is to provide the customers with high efficient service to fulfill them.

The sustainability proof of Emirates Airline:

The sustainability of Emirates airline is proved using the Environment indicators of the company i.e. the emission of the carbon-di-oxide from the airliner is compared with other airliners in the Aviation sector to show the sustainability condition. The other criteria are by taking the consumption of the company into account for two years to show the sustainability condition.

Passenger Fuel Efficiency:

The International Air Transportation Association (IATA) is the Governing body for the Airline companies for promoting sustainability. The Passenger fuel efficiency is the measure of number of fuel (in liters) burned to fly 100 kilometers distance and IATA has fixed a target to airline industry as 5.4 liters per 100 passenger kilometers in 2010 to control the carbon-di-oxide emission to the environment. The Emirates airline has an efficiency of 4.12 liters per passenger kilometers in 2010.

Passenger fuel efficiency of Cathay Pacific, Lufthansa Group is 4.84 and 4.20 per 100 passenger kilometer. The efficiency of the Emirates is 12.5% better than the IATA, these values depicts that Emirates is a sustainable company.

Carbon-di-oxide emission:

The carbon-di-oxide emission is the measure of release of carbon-di-oxide (in grams) to the air passenger flying for particular distance. The IATA has set as 136.5 grams of carbon-di-oxide as a base limit to all airliners in the world. The Emirates value is 101.8 grams of carbon-di-oxide per passenger kilometer which is 25% better than IATA value. While comparing with other airliners value i.e. 119.7 grams for Cathay Pacific, 106.1 grams for British airways, 105.8 grams for Lufthansa airways reveals that the company has sustainable efficient rate for carbon-di-oxide emission. The carbon-di-oxide emission efficiency percentage of 0.75 kilogram of carbon-di-oxide per tonne kilometer is also most effective than other airlines value.

Consumption of water, electricity:

2010-2011

2011-2012

% of change

Fuel consumption(litres/head/day)

2.37

1.83

(22.8)

Water use(litres/head/day)

358

318

(11)

Wastes collected(tonnes)

4,917

5,340

8.6

Fuel consumption(ground operations) litres

34,810,453

32,597,263

(6.4)

The tabular column indicates the consumption of resources of an Emirates Airline company. While comparing the usage of the company for 2010 and 2011 reveals that the company has reduced the usage of Fuel per employer 22.8 from 2010 to sustain the fossil fuels for the future purposes. The fuel consumption of petrol, diesel and gas for the ground level operations of the company has reduced to 6.4 percentages for sustainability. The wastes recycling has been promoted by the Emirates company to collect the wastes from the flights and ground operations and to recycle them for the future use this will reduce the consumption of paper, aluminium cans, cardboards to promote sustainability to the environment.

Recommendations to the Emirates Airline:

The Emirates airline company is a sustainable company which has been described in the report. To promote sustainability the company has to focus innovative flights for their operations and to provide regular Over Haul maintenance practices to the turbine engines used by the company. The practices will lead to fuel efficient engine performance. The amount of US$4 billion has been spending the purchase of Aviation turbine fuel for flight operations.

The advanced aircrafts like Boeing 787 dreamliner and B747-8F are the two aircrafts with advanced technology oriented, so the company has to use the aircraft for flight operations because the fuselage structure is composed of composites to 50% of the weight which reduces the weight of the aircraft which in turn reduces the fuel consumption and carbon emissions from the exhaust of the engine. The Boeing 747-8F has fuel efficiency of 16% greater than B 747-400.

The Airbus A 350-XWB is an advanced aircraft which has fuel consumption ratio of 25% less than Airbus aircrafts. The innovative technology in the wing, fuselage, and propulsion systems induces the efficiency to greater extent. So the Emirates have to make use of these flights to reduce environmental emissions to promote sustainability.

The Emirates has to implement environment emission control practices for the aircrafts to reduce the carbon-di-oxide emission to the atmosphere, use of bio-degradable materials for flight services and employer’s has to create awareness to the airline customer’s society to promote sustainability in the environment. The social activities of the Emirates Company has in a pioneer growth, the company has to continue its service by building schools and hospitals to countries facing inflations.

The company has research for the use of alternate fuels for the engine operations to reduce the fuel consumption because the price of Aviation fuel increases tremendously. The growth of Airline industries creates a fuel demand in the industry and the steep rise in price makes the company to invest more and it affects the economic sustainability of the company. The Recycling of wastes has to be promoted by the company to reduce the consumption of organic plastics and other derivatives.

The consumption of electricity, waste generation, carbon footprints from catering and ground services has to be controlled to promote sustainability in the business market. The sustainability awareness program has to implement in the company and the employees need to be educated about the sustainability practices.

Conclusion:

The report proves sustainability of an Emirates airline company on analysis of their environment context of the company. The analysis includes the use of carbon emission to the atmosphere, consumption of fuel, water by the Emirates employees and waste management of the company. The result reveals the growth of the company towards sustainability in the business. When considering the social and economic context the analysis shows the company has firm sustainable strategy in the Aviation market to promote eco-friendly environment for the future.

The sustainability has been achieved because of the corporate goals of the Emirates group concentrates sustainable practices in the business. The company spends the profit to conserve the bio-diversity of the trees and animal species in Australia to have sustainable business environment throughout the world. The relationship of company towards charitable organizations has a pioneer status in the field of corporate social committee. This makes the company to be a member of sustainable organizations in the world.

REFERNCES

www.emirates.com

www.theemiratesgroup.com

http://www.emirates.com/english/about/about_emirates.aspx

http://www.airployment.com/emirates_airlines.php

http://www.emiratesairline.co.uk/

http://www.emirates.com/in/english/index.aspx?cid=GoogleSEM07India24&pkw=yes

http://www.theemiratesgroup.com/english/default.aspx

http://www.emirates.com/english/environment/efficiency_and_technology/emirates_fleet.aspx

http://www.towards-sustainability.co.uk/infodir/susquote.html

http://www.vanderbilt.edu/sustainvu/who-we-are/what-is-sustainability/

http://www.airportsgoinggreen.org/Content/Documents/Kevin%20Welsh.pdf

http://www.emiratesairlinefoundation.org/english/News-and-Updates/News-Letters/Emirates_Airline_Foundation_seven_years.aspx

http://www.iisd.org/sd/