Founded by pilots and built around a philosophy of reducing workload through better information, SkyPath has spent years developing tools that turn turbulence from an unpredictable hazard into a data-driven operational factor. Today, the company is applying that same expertise to one of aviation’s biggest climate challenges: contrail mitigation.

We chatted with Guy Zunder, SkyPath’s Chief Product Officer, to discuss the company’s origins, its turbulence forecasting platform, and how its recent partnership with Google is helping bring contrail awareness into day-to-day flight operations.

The Crowdsourcing Flywheel

The technical core of the SkyPath platform is a patented iPad-based accelerometer. By utilizing the tablet’s built-in sensors, SkyPath differentiates turbulence signals from background noise and filters out vibrations to collect high-quality data without the need for hardware installation or aircraft certification. This approach allowed the company to rapidly increase coverage, creating a “crowdsourcing flywheel” that now processes over 9 billion data points per year.

This focus on using a pilot’s existing tools was a deliberate design choice aimed at reducing workload while increasing adoption. Rather than asking airlines to install new hardware, SkyPath meets pilots where they already work, applying a “by aviators, for aviators” perspective that shapes every aspect of the company’s development:

• Cockpit-Out Development: As the founders are pilots, the product was built from the perspective of those in the flight deck, ensuring the technology serves real-world needs rather than abstract engineering goals.

• Cross-Operational Reach: While this DNA started in the cockpit, it now extends across the entire operation. The same aviator-centric focus guides how SkyPath serves dispatchers, safety teams, and airline management.

• Workload Reduction: At the heart of their design philosophy is a commitment to making safety easier. The app operates seamlessly in the background on the iPad so that users do not have to seek critical information.

• Proactive Intelligence: The system is designed to deliver proactive alerts precisely when and where they are needed, moving the industry from reactive responses to informed, ahead-of-time planning.

• Actionable Layers: As SkyPath introduces new capabilities, such as the contrail mitigation layer, they apply this same standard: the data must be highly visible and immediately actionable, ensuring no one in the operational chain has to think twice before making a decision.

Collecting turbulence data is only part of the challenge. The next step is turning those massive amounts of observations into actionable insights that can be utilized across the broader airline operation.

A Unified Safety Ecosystem

SkyPath’s OneLayer architecture serves as a unified foundation, connecting pilots, dispatchers, cabin crew, and safety teams into a single ecosystem. This “SkyPath 360” approach ensures situational awareness across the entire airline. For dispatchers, the platform provides live and predictive data to support both tactical and strategic decisions, while serving as a critical link to the flight deck.

For cabin crew, who experience the majority of turbulence-related injuries, advance warning can make a significant difference. SkyPath reports that its alerting capabilities have helped reduce those injuries by providing crews with additional time to prepare the cabin before turbulence is encountered.

This impact is made possible through state-of-the-art AI nowcasting models that provide global coverage and predict conditions up to 24 hours ahead. Recently, the company expanded its SkyPath Shield platform to include a GPS Interference Layer, helping crews identify and navigate modern threats such as jamming and spoofing.

Beyond Turbulence

While turbulence remains the foundation of the SkyPath platform, the company has recently expanded its focus into an area receiving growing attention across the aviation industry: non-CO2 climate impacts. Among these, contrails have emerged as one of the most promising opportunities for near-term climate action, leading airlines, regulators, and technology providers to explore ways of identifying and avoiding the atmospheric conditions that produce them.

For SkyPath, the move into contrails was not about entering an entirely new field, but about applying an existing operational platform to a new challenge.

Through their strategic partnership with Google, SkyPath has integrated a dedicated Contrails Layer powered by Google’s AI forecasting technology. Google’s models analyze satellite imagery and atmospheric data to identify Ice Super-Saturated Regions (ISSRs), the conditions most likely to produce persistent warming contrails. This partnership offers several key advantages:

• Identifying High-Impact Contrails: The layer allows pilots to distinguish between contrails that have little climate impact and those associated with the greatest warming potential, helping crews focus on the scenarios that matter most.

• Minimizing Operational Impact: Real-world testing has shown that many contrail avoidance maneuvers require only minor altitude adjustments. In some cases, contrail formation can be reduced by 54% while increasing fuel burn by as little as 0.3% across all flights.

• Combining Climate and Safety Data: By displaying contrail forecasts alongside turbulence information, pilots and dispatchers can evaluate both considerations simultaneously, ensuring that sustainability decisions never come at the expense of safety.

The result is a tool that allows crews to visualize high-impact contrail regions up to 24 hours ahead and incorporate that information into normal flight planning and operational decision-making.

Integrating Safety and Sustainability

For SkyPath, the challenge is not simply identifying contrails, but helping crews make informed operational decisions when multiple factors are competing for attention. As Zunder emphasized, “You don’t want to avoid a contrail by flying into severe turbulence.”

The integration of turbulence and contrail data reflects a broader shift taking place across aviation. As trials continue to demonstrate the viability of contrail avoidance, the challenge is becoming less about the technology itself and more about how these practices can be incorporated into everyday flight operations.

Standardizing the Future

Looking ahead, SkyPath is expanding its footprint with Predictive Insights, a strategic planning platform that gives airlines a full-year view of turbulence patterns to improve long-range network planning. When asked about the hardest problem still ahead, Zunder pointed not to technology, but to adoption.

As airlines continue searching for practical ways to reduce their environmental impact while maintaining safe and efficient operations, companies like SkyPath are exploring how tools originally built for flight safety can support sustainability as well. Whether contrail-aware operations become standard practice remains to be seen, but growing industry interest, new regulatory frameworks, and advancements in forecasting technology suggest that the conversation is only beginning.

Find them at:

SkyPath Official Website

SkyPath on LinkedIn

We spoke with Maxime Meijers, co-founder and CEO of Estuaire, to gain a deeper understanding of the company’s work, its approach to aviation climate impact, and the trajectory ahead. This article draws on insights from that conversation.

Estuaire’s Role in the Aviation Ecosystem

Estuaire’s role today is multifaceted, functioning as a bridge between historical data and real-time operational action. The platform serves two primary purposes:

• Historical Climate Analytics: Providing a globally consistent dataset for stakeholders to understand the true environmental footprint of past flights.

• Flight optimization: Offering tools to integrate environmental impact directly into flight planning alongside traditional cost constraints.

While many sustainability efforts in aviation focus on long-term goals like cleaner fuels or airframe technology, Estuaire chose to concentrate on data and operational insights because “improving how flights are actually flown today can deliver faster climate gains than waiting for new aircraft or fuels.” By identifying lateral routing detours caused by fragmented airspace and vertical profile inefficiencies due to congestion, Estuaire uncovers opportunities to reduce both fuel burn and non-CO2 effects.

From Data Pipeline to Value Chain Impact

The foundation of Estuaire’s intelligence lies in its ability to synthesize disparate data streams into a unified environmental profile.

This same data channel that enables real-time operational decisions also creates a high-resolution, standardized view of aviation’s climate impact at scale. As a result, Estuaire’s insights extend beyond flight optimization, supporting a multi-lever approach across the aviation value chain through:

• Airport & Ground Operations: Tracking airport operations by leveraging radar data to model taxiing emissions, support Scope 3 monitoring, and enable incentive schemes for Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAF).

• Corporate Travel Intelligence: Bringing non-CO2 insights into the corporate sector through its collaboration with Advito, enabling travel management organizations to make more climate-conscious booking decisions.

• Ecosystem Analytics & Decision Support: Supporting manufacturers, financiers, and lessors with high-resolution data to evaluate aircraft performance, monitor financed emissions, and assess alignment with Net Zero pathways.

• Platform & Technical Acceleration: Continuing to scale the data pipeline and optimization capabilities, supported by recent team expansion, to improve accuracy, coverage, and operational impact.

When Regulation Meets Operations

Much of Estuaire’s current focus is driven by the immediate regulatory shift facing the industry. As of January 1, 2025, the revised EU ETS Directive has mandated that airlines monitor and report their non-CO2 impacts for intra-European flights. This puts Monitoring, Reporting, and Verification (MRV) at the top of the agenda for airline executives who must now account for effects that were once considered too uncertain to regulate. Airlines now have a free automated tool called NEATS to monitor those effects so awareness is building fast.

Estuaire facilitates this transition by identifying high-impact flights – the small percentage of trajectories that form in Ice-Supersaturated Regions (ISSRs) and cause disproportionate warming. By targeting this small subset of flights, airlines can implement minor altitude adjustments (typically 2,000 to 4,000 feet) that significantly reduce contrail formation without disrupting operations.

This approach is already being deployed in collaboration with airlines such as Air France, Vueling, and others, where Estuaire integrates directly into pre-flight planning. Flight plans are analyzed before filing, passed through a contrail prediction model, and – when climate thresholds are exceeded – optimized trajectories are proposed to dispatch. The process is fully automated: the dispatcher simply accepts the revised plan, and the pilots fly it as scheduled.

By embedding contrail avoidance into day-to-day operations, Estuaire enables immediate, measurable climate impact reduction. While MRV frameworks are primarily designed for reporting, these operational improvements naturally feed into them, ensuring that avoided contrail impact can ultimately be quantified, verified, and recognized within emerging regulatory structures.

Overcoming Barriers to Scale Contrail Avoidance

Despite the potential, scaling contrail avoidance globally faces hurdles. Funding remains a primary barrier, as aviation is a highly competitive industry where any additional cost is heavily scrutinized – particularly in a fuel environment where margins are tightly linked to fuel burn, and even small operational changes must be carefully balanced against efficiency.

To address this, Estuaire advocates for incentives, such as providing free emissions allowances to airlines that proactively avoid warming contrails. Then, there is the confidence barrier, where airlines need to see that contrail areas are forecasted with high accuracy before they commit to rerouting.

To ensure trust and improve accuracy, Estuaire provides a structured Contrail Avoidance Implementation Checklist consisting of seven phases:

1. Knowing the Opportunity: Building a historical inventory of high-impact flights.

2. Data Preparation: Ensuring real-time access to aircraft mass and position.

3. Defining the Intervention Area: Selecting flight candidates.

4. Setting Constraints: Establishing operational guardrails (e.g., fuel penalty caps).

5. Shadow Trials: Verifying optimized trajectories in a simulated environment.

6. Real Trials: Executing actual avoidance flights.

7. Debrief: Using satellite data (like GOES or MTG) to confirm the contrail was actually avoided.

The Road Ahead

As Estuaire moves deeper into 2026, the company is shifting from validating its models to large-scale industry adoption. The most significant signal of this transition is the recently announced partnership with Air France. As a major flag carrier, Air France’s commitment to utilizing Estuaire’s platform to accelerate its environmental transition marks a turning point in the industry’s approach to non-CO2 effects. By synthesizing Estuaire’s intelligence into their flight systems, the airline is moving beyond academic research to actively optimizing flights for total climate impact.

Beyond flagship airline partnerships, the road ahead for Estuaire is one of continued growth and technical advancement. While long-term solutions like hydrogen or new airframe designs are years away, data-driven optimization can happen every time a pilot receives a flight plan.

Ultimately, Estuaire is building a shared data infrastructure that connects climate science, operations, and policy. By proving that contrail avoidance can be integrated into legacy processes without major disruptions, the startup is helping the industry move from measurement to meaningful action, ensuring that every flight plan is informed by its total impact on the planet.

Contrails, the visible white streaks formed behind aircraft, can grow into long-lasting cirrus clouds in Ice Supersaturation Regions (ISSRs) and typically lead to a significant, overall warming effect. The necessity for the BeCoM project was underscored by recent scientific findings and an EU report that highlighted the difficulty in accurately predicting the atmospheric conditions required for navigational avoidance using existing models.

BeCoM was established as a direct response to this scientific challenge. The project’s main objective will be achieved by enhancing the prediction of ISSRs in Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) models and developing the climate policy concepts needed for the confident avoidance of persistent, warming contrails. Targeted avoidance is potentially a highly impactful strategy because a disproportionately small fraction of flights is responsible for the overall warming effect from contrails.

The Collaborative Framework

As with most Horizon Europe projects, BeCoM operates as a collaborative effort. This consortium, brings together diverse partners to manifest the practicality of atmospheric science. The project emphasizes that its versatile nature is key to tackling the complexity of contrail mitigation. The Work Packages below demonstrate this integrated approach.

BeCoM’s work is organized into seven Work Packages (WPs), most of which are highly technical and scientific endeavors but with an overall goal to translate science into actionable insights for European policymakers.

The fundamental components of the 5 technical WPs include:

• Operational & New Measurements & Characterization (WP1): Seeks to enhance the measurement of atmospheric humidity at cruise altitude, addressing the critical challenge posed by the high variability of relative humidity (RH) and the scarcity of regular humidity measurements at flight levels.

• Cloud Physics & Weather Models & Assimilation (WP2): Aims to improve the representation of ISSRs in NWP models. The DWD leads this effort and is designing a new concept for ice cloud microphysics to accurately model ice cloud persistence and refine ISSR predictive performance.

• Evaluation of Data and Model Predictions (WP3): Led by THALES Research and Technology, this involves developing appropriate AI algorithms for data assimilation, contrail detection, contrail classification, and uncertainty quantification in contrail predictions. AI algorithms are applied to image analysis tasks (detection and segmentation) using data from satellites and ground all-sky imagers, which is necessary for confirming persistent contrail predictions and assisting in continuous monitoring.

• Climate Optimized Trajectories (WP4): Led by TU Delft, this line of work integrates improved contrail prediction capacity into the EMAC Earth-System model coupled with the AirTraf simulator and facilitates the development of climate-optimized flight paths by explicitly balancing conventional airline operational costs with the newly calculated climate cost of contrails.

• Policy-driven Flight Planning (WP5): Focuses on developing and evaluating non-CO2-based measures suitable for Air Traffic Management (ATM) strategies. This work includes developing “algorithmic 4-D cost functions for climate change” and a corresponding “monetarization logic“ for non-CO2 effects to incentivize airlines and Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs) to avoid contrail formation zones.

BeCoM is working to facilitate a substantial reduction of aviation’s share of global warming on a much shorter time horizon by enabling the confident forecast and successful avoidance of strongly warming contrails through trajectory optimization. For example, the development of algorithmic 4-D cost functions is intended to guide airspace users and ANSPs in flying more climate-cost-optimized routes – if the methodology developed proves sufficiently accurate.

Looking ahead, BeCoM has a clear vision for operational changes in air traffic management. As the project approaches its conclusion in May 2026, the BeCoM team anticipates the convergence of its extensive scientific efforts.

Interview Highlights

We had a virtual sit down with the project coordinator, Feijia Yin, for a question-and-answer session to take a deeper look at BeCoM:

Q: Who and what is behind the BeCoM acronym, what are some of its major objectives, and how did it come into being?

A: BeCoM, or Better Contrails Mitigation, is a four-year EU-funded research project that began in June 2022 under the Horizon Europe program. Our main objective is to significantly reduce aviation’s climate impact by enhancing the prediction of ISSRs in the NWP models and climate policy concepts needed for the confident avoidance of persistent, warming contrails.

Q: How does such a multi-disciplinary consortium enhance the project’s ability to tackle the complex issue of contrail mitigation?

A: Tackling contrails requires linking science to operation. The consortium includes the Delft University of Technology for coordination and trajectory optimization, the German Weather Service (DWD) for operational weather modeling, in particular, data assimilation in the NWP model of ICON, the Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR) for cloud microphysics modeling for NWP models, climate policy, and the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) for water vapor measurements at cruise altitudes using ground LIDAR. This of course is complemented with Thales’ work contrail detections using AI and ENVISA’s contribution for policy engagement and dissemination.

Q: Can you explain how the distinct Work Packages interact to create a comprehensive approach?

A: With the risk of oversimplifying the work under the work packages, WP1 enhances data gathering, particularly for humidity measurements, which WP2 then uses to improve NWP models’ capabilities to forecast spatial and temporal atmospheric conditions that are specific for persistent contrail formation. The results are then validated by WP3 and used by WP4 for flight path optimization. Finally, WP5 translates the contrail avoidance methods derived from the research work into terms that policy-makers work with and consider incorporating in future regulatory frameworks aiming to reduce contrail climate impacts.

Q: One of the objectives is to leverage technologies like LIDAR, radiosondes, and enhanced AMDAR to create the high-resolution database needed to improve weather models. Can you tell us more?

A: Atmospheric humidity is indeed highly variable and this makes its prediction difficult, at least with current weather models. One important aspect is the model initial conditions, which are usually observational data. One of our consortium partners, CNRS, is utilizing ground-based LIDAR for detailed water vapor measurements (100-meter vertical resolution). They also ran a successful radiosonde campaign recently. We are also working on utilizing enhanced AMDAR (Aircraft Meteorological Data Relay) and IAGOS to increase the volume of in-situ data collected by commercial aircraft.

Q: Could you explain the limitations of current models and how the new ice cloud microphysics concepts being developed in WP2 will lead to more accurate contrail persistence forecasts?

A: Current NWP models do simplify somewhat the ice cloud physics representation, primarily to save on computational resources, sometimes based on unrealistic assumptions around ice supersaturation. The new concepts developed by DLR in WP2 aim to address that designing a scheme where ice clouds persistence is modeled more accurately and computationally affordable. This would improve the forecasting capabilities of ISSRs where persistent contrails form.

Q: How are you engaging with airlines, air navigation service providers, and policymakers through your dissemination work to ensure your scientific findings and tools are understood, trusted, and ultimately adopted by the industry?

A: BeCoM is already engaged in discussions with stakeholders from industry and authorities about the feasibility of including methodologies developed in the project into policy measures. A larger dissemination workshop towards the end of the project, with participation from all these stakeholders, will allow collecting stakeholders’ feedback about the project outcomes and jointly define ways the research outcomes can be best implemented.

Q: Ultimately, what is BeCoM’s vision for 2030? If the project is fully successful, how will air travel be different for an airline pilot or an air traffic controller in terms of their daily operations and decision-making?

A: Ideally, methods to avoid contrails will be fully integrated in trajectory optimization tools and will not require much additional work by pilots or controllers. However, this may take longer than 2030…

Q: Finally, what are you most excited about in the contrail mitigation space over the next year?

A: Seeing all results of the different work packages of BeCoM come together and discussing them with the stakeholders.

With a background in aerospace engineering, Finlay is well-versed in the ins and outs of the technical side of aviation. He has extensive knowledge spanning the breadth of the industry and was more than happy to share that knowledge.

About Safe Landing

First of all, let’s look at what the organization is and what they stand for. Safe Landing is a dynamic worldwide community of workers, students, and enthusiasts from across the aviation industry united by a powerful vision: living in a world where aviation flourishes in harmony with nature, allowing the beauty of flying to be enjoyed by all, for generations to come.

As an organization founded by and comprising aviation insiders, Safe Landing aims to connect and empower people to create a better future. At the heart of their mission is the drive to motivate industry leaders to align with climate science and move away from unchecked conventional growth which could further harm the environment, with a complementary focus on understanding and mitigating aviation's non-CO2 emissions, especially contrails.

Composed of individuals who love both flying and the planet, Safe Landing promotes sustainable aviation as the key to enable aviation to develop without further harming the environment. They operate on the principle that industry leaders often have short-term interests and may ignore longer-term risks on the horizon, such as climate change. Thus, necessitating the development of an independent, worker-led vision for the future of aviation. This approach aims to bridge the "us vs. them" mentality often seen between environmental groups and industry, demonstrating that the industry can develop responsibly and conscientiously.

The Focus of Their Efforts

Safe Landing's advocacy is structured around four key proposals for industry leaders: to (i) be honest about the total environmental impact of flying, (ii) be realistic about the limits of technology, (iii) be transparent about future regulations, and (iv) to have a plan that accounts for this and supports workers during any transition. Their work spans broad challenges, such as constructively critiquing conventional airport expansion plans, critically analyzing proposed solutions like Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF), and creating initiatives and policies to raise awareness of and mitigate the full scope of aviation’s environmental impact.

These proposals are designed to safeguard the future of aviation workers whose jobs could be at risk if aviation’s growth is left unchecked. “If we blow our global carbon budget for a safe level of global warming within the next decade, as projected, then we may be forced into severely limiting our flying in the future.”

In a specific effort to drive policy change, Safe Landing put forth and presented concise proposals for COP29 (the 2024 UN Climate Change Conference):

• Include international aviation emissions in Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) submitted in 2025.

• Include the total climate impact of aviation (e.g., contrails) in NDCs.

• Establish an "Aviation Ambition Coalition" of leading nations (like the EU27, US, China, UK) to drive climate action.

• Introduce an international air passenger levy to replace the ineffective CORSIA scheme, with funds potentially used for decarbonization and "loss & damage" in developing countries.

Finlay pointed out that the aviation industry is projected to become the largest emitting sector in the UK within the next 10-15 years, highlighting the urgent need for action beyond decarbonization alone. A significant and growing focus of their efforts is on aviation's non-CO2 emissions, such as contrails (which we discussed in detail) nitrogen oxides (NOx), water vapor, soot, and sulphate aerosols.

Down the Contrail Rabbit Hole

Finlay stressed that “contrails are the climate opportunity of the decade" for air travel and addressing their effects is one of the easiest ways to immediately reduce aviation's contribution to global warming. Despite a growing scientific consensus on their impact, contrails have often been overlooked, with the industry sitting on its hands, making excuses for not addressing them. They employ delay tactics straight out of the Big Tobacco playbook, citing uncertainty as a reason not to take action.

Safe Landing counters this inaction by emphasizing that uncertainty is inherent in aviation and that it should lead to more trials and testing, not less. Finlay referenced the Precautionary Principle, asserting that potential harm to health or the environment should not be postponed due to a lack of scientific certainty. The urgency of the situation should be a driving force to mitigate that uncertainty.

The uncertainty is no longer an acceptable excuse. Metrics can be established and shared across the industry to decide whether or not to avoid a potential contrail-forming region. For instance, Finlay mentioned flight planning organizations like Flightkeys and SATAVIA, which are already developing alternative flight paths to optimize fuel and cost. They are even refining software to predict contrail-forming regions to include contrail avoidance protocols during the flight.

The Opportunity of Contrail Avoidance

The conversation shifted to practical ideas for expanding contrail avoidance. Adjusting flight routes to avoid ice supersaturated regions (ISSRs) is proving to be the most viable option, yet there is push back regarding potential extra fuel burn. However, operational strategies like varying flight speeds for fuel efficiency already exist, demonstrating that additional fuel burn for contrail avoidance could also be accommodated. Furthermore, studies like the one published by Transport & Environment highlight that the additional costs for contrail avoidance would be negligible compared to the potential climate benefits.

Finlay highlighted that fuel burn concerns from airlines feel disingenuous as pilots are regularly instructed to tanker additional fuel from where it can be purchased most cheaply, fly elongated routes to avoid national airspace charges, and fly faster than the optimum cruise speed in order to reach destinations faster. All of these economic decisions create increased fuel burn. Contrail avoidance could be limited to a less than 1-2% additional fuel burn per flight, and would only be required on less than 5% of flights, so additional fuel burn at a global level would be very insignificant.

That said, applying contrail avoidance measures across the entire industry is no small feat, as it involves the coordination of airlines, flight planners, air navigation service providers (ANSPs), air traffic management (ATM), the pilots and crew, and more. With this in mind, Safe Landing advocates for targeted contrail avoidance efforts, focusing on trans-Atlantic, long-haul, and night flights, as these have been shown to have a greater warming effect.

As part of their mission, Safe Landing is exploring practical ways to encourage contrail mitigation, such as:

• Developing a toolkit for airlines and staff: This toolkit would guide airlines through a multi-step process, starting from acknowledging contrail impact – more on this in the next section.

• Forming a "Contrail Coalition" or "CoMit": They propose a transatlantic partnership between North American and European countries, which have a strong aviation pedigree, high flying populations, and are where most warming contrails occur. This coalition would commit to COntrail MITigation (COMIT) and could serve as a starting point for broader climate action in aviation.

• A "Contrails Pledge" for COP30: Similar to the Methane Pledge, this initiative would aim to set a target for contrail elimination and establish a pathway to achieve it, focusing on influential North Atlantic nations.

Finlay used a powerful analogy to summarize the potential impact of contrail avoidance: imagine aviation CO2 emissions are like adding t-shirts, accumulating warmth over time and difficult to remove, while contrails are a ski-jacket, an easy-to-remove layer of warmth on top. By simply removing the large ski-jacket, it enables one’s concentration to shift to removing the t-shirts. Ultimately suggesting that “removing contrails buys you more time to decarbonize," then addressing the more persistent CO2 emissions. “If you were sweating in a sauna with all of these layers of clothing on, which would you try to remove immediately?”

A Look at the Airline Contrail Toolkit

In an effort to boost contrail awareness, Finlay described how Safe Landing is working on the idea of developing a toolkit for airlines and their staff to learn more about the issue and what they can do about it. This toolkit would include a step-by-step process of engagement:

1. At a minimum, the airline would acknowledge the climate impact of contrails.

2. The airline could provide an information page, highlighting what they know about contrails and their impact.

3. The airline would identify someone, or a team within the airline or organization, working on the issue.

4. They could provide proof showing they are actively involved in research or trials.

5. They could describe their active participation in actual contrail avoidance during routine flight operations.

6. Finally, they could share the lessons they’ve gleaned across the industry to spur further action and help to shape policy decisions.

Safe Landing envisions harnessing this toolkit as a means to achieve an industry-wide standard for contrail awareness and best avoidance practices. Airlines that attain different levels within the toolkit can receive corresponding ratings – Bronze, Silver, Gold, etc. feeding into the Airline Contrail Index compiled by Blue Lines. Safe Landing can use the diverse backgrounds of their members to share and push the progressive policies in this area broadening the reach of contrail action throughout the industry.

What's Brewing

Safe Landing has a busy schedule planned for the near future to advance its advocacy and community-building efforts. Here are a few things to look out for:

• Worker Assembly: On September 13th, they hosted an assembly of aviation workers to collaboratively envision a sustainable future for the industry.

• Conference Season: They will be attending various UK political conferences to discuss the economic opportunities presented by sustainable aviation.

• Innovation Series: Finlay Asher is leading an interview series featuring forward-thinking organizations that are shaping the future of aviation.

• Advocacy Day: On January 21st 2026, Safe Landing will be in the UK Houses of Parliament to present proposals concerning zero-emission aircraft and contrails.

• Ongoing COP30 Engagement: They will continue to push for the inclusion of aviation emissions, including contrails, in national climate plans.

• Media Presence: Co-founders George Hibberd and Todd Smith’s involvement in the "Guilt Trip" documentary and Safe Landing's appearances on BBC Radio and LBC discussing airport expansion continue to raise public awareness.

• Community Growth: Safe Landing invites aviation workers concerned about the climate and the industry's future to join their community for discussions on effective climate action.

In Closing

Safe Landing stands as a vital and proactive community of aviation workers and enthusiasts dedicated to forging a sustainable future for the industry. By challenging unchecked growth and demanding honesty, realism, transparency, and a worker-led plan from industry leaders, they aim to protect both the planet and the long-term job security of aviation professionals. Their focus on removing the contrail ski-jacket, represents a critical short-term climate opportunity. Through practical initiatives like developing airline toolkits, proposing a "Contrail Coalition" or "CoMit", and a "Contrails Pledge" for COP30, Safe Landing is actively pushing for actionable, worker-led solutions.

Ultimately, Safe Landing's vision is to bridge the gap between environmental concerns and industry practices, demonstrating that a responsible and ecologically conscious aviation sector is not only possible but a win-win-win for workers, wider society, and the planet.

You can find them at:

https://safe-landing.org/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/safe-landing-org/

For this first edition, we sat down with Omar Nuruzade, the CEO of Nexus Lab, to discuss the company’s goals, accomplishments, and current projects. Nexus Lab is making tremendous progress in the field of contrail detection and avoidance as well as the reporting of aircraft emissions; and they’re only just getting started.

Who They Are

Founded in 2022, Nexus Lab is a software company helping airlines and aviation stakeholders monitor, report, reduce, and manage their non-CO2 impact. Their goal is to build a data management system that utilizes highly accurate satellite detection to help airlines reduce contrail formation and satellite imagery to use as proof of avoidance. If successful, their contrail avoidance technology could become the industry standard to reducing the climate effect of contrails and making aviation more sustainable.

What They Do

Nexus Lab develops verifiable contrail avoidance systems and streamlines the reporting process for airlines. Nexus Lab’s cutting-edge technology automatically manages flight data for efficient emissions reporting and provides proof of contrail avoidance through satellite imagery. This method helps airlines decrease their full-time equivalent (FTE) and significantly increase the accuracy of their reporting.

What Sets Them Apart

Using machine learning on satellite, flight, and meteorological data, Nexus software predicts contrail formation zones and builds optimal flight routes to reduce contrail formation.

Nexus Lab also offers airlines a dashboard with vital insights into top destinations, flight levels, and both CO2 and non-CO2 emissions called a "Source of Truth for Non-CO2 Impact" dashboard. This dashboard helps airlines comply with the EU’s monitoring, reporting, and verifying (MRV) framework by having early access to the NEATS tool specifications, enabling airlines to build a streamlined template for data submission. It could also be useful to predict fuel and ticket costs down the road.

What sets this dashboard apart is its ability to help airlines collect crucial parameters for reporting, fine-tune their understanding of costs, and manage key performance indicators (KPIs). It’s specially designed for sustainability and focuses on data such as aircraft type comparisons, engine performances, short haul vs. long haul flights, inside EU and outside EU operations, CO2 vs. non-CO2 emissions, departure times, and emissions per flight hour.

Additionally, Nexus offers the Nexus Dynamic Climate Cost Index (NDCCI), a tool that analyzes scheduled flights, estimates CO2 and non-CO2 impacts, calculates additional fuel and time, and suggests optimized flight plans and support for EU-ETS reporting.

One of the greatest challenges Nexus Lab has faced when reaching out to new airlines, is the demand for proof that a contrail has indeed been avoided. Omar was confident the company is building the satellite technology necessary to provide that proof avoidance and is tackling the many hurdles required to comply with EU reporting standards.

What they’ve Accomplished

Even with the aforementioned challenges, the company has accomplished a lot in its few years in service. We asked Omar to highlight some of the milestones along their journey:

• Calculating emissions impacts for additional fuel and time and providing the most optimized flight plans through their NDCCI.

• Helping airlines collect important parameters for reporting and fine-tuning their understanding of mitigation costs by analyzing more than 10 KPIs.

• Identifying and pinpointing high-impact aircraft and routes.

• Demonstrating results of contrail avoidance through satellite verification and non-CO₂ reporting.

• Harnessing their technology to help airlines save an average of 7 Tons of CO₂e (GWP100).

• Decreasing the FTE work by half for airlines managing the same workload.

• Achieving 2-3 times more accurate emissions reporting, particularly for intra-EU flights.

• Delivering automatic and compliant reporting for non-CO2 emissions.

• Offering customizable data tracking and comparison of CO2 to non-CO2 emissions within the user interface for airlines.

What They Are Working On

Furthering their mission, Omar described several initiatives in which Nexus Lab is actively involved:

• Integrating their software automatically with the NEATS tool to streamline data input for airlines.

• Conducting trials for contrail avoidance and currently sharing data with an airline.

• Developing satellite technology to provide verifiable proof of avoidance.

• Getting more airlines on board to simplify their reporting.

• Finessing detection and avoidance of contrails via satellite imagery.

• Hosting webinars.

  • They hosted a webinar on July 16th focusing on airline strategy and building confidence in reporting non-CO2 emissions. They particularly zoomed in on the key factors in reporting and how they are analyzed.

• Finally, publishing various white papers covering important information in contrail avoidance, satellite detection, accurate reporting and more.

What is Coming Down the Pipeline

Omar had expressed that he is most excited about the detection and avoidance of contrails via satellite imagery; and using that satellite detection to provide proof of avoidance. They are eager to get this capability fully operational and connect satellites from the US, EU, and soon Asia, enabling them to cover most of the globe.

Their next webinar will be on August 13 at 9:00am EST, discussing how flight parameters can influence non-CO2 ETS reporting.

In the coming months, Nexus Lab plans to join an accelerator program aimed at fostering the growth of startups in the USA through fundraising and investor networking.

They will also have a company booth at the World Aviation Festival in Lisbon later this year, exhibiting their technology and answering questions about their work.

You can find them at:

https://nexuslab.us/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/nexus-lab-netzero