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Aviation CO2 and Contrail Cirrus: True Costs (bioengineer.org)
submitted 3 weeks ago by ooli3@sopuli.xyz to c/ecology@mander.xyz
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[-] porcoesphino@mander.xyz 4 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

I wouldn't trust this news org and would consider blocking just from the image. At first I was trying to work out if there was some optical illusion but then I decided to skim the article and there is this at the end: "Image Credits: AI Generated". To anyone that bothered to internalise what they wrote about, the contrails coming from the cockpit instead of the engine is just glaring. It's the focal point of the imagine. I didn't read the scientific article but I noticed in the scan that the bioengineering one mentions changing fuels to one with lower water output and that's interesting from a combustion equation point of view (and I'm sure there are creative ways to improve this but emphasising it makes me question the person writing this, or I expect machine)

[-] ooli3@sopuli.xyz 2 points 3 weeks ago
[-] porcoesphino@mander.xyz 2 points 3 weeks ago

I didn't have an issue seeing the link to the scientific paper, I just had no motivation to read it. Now I'm waiting for a train so I scanned it and its more reasonable:

Currently analyzed mitigation strategies for reducing contrail cirrus forcing include a reduction of soot emissions through (a) the use of fuels with a lower aromatic content than present fossil jet fuel, (b) the use of engines emitting less soot and (c) through rerouting of flights so as to avoid contrail forming regions

But most of the scientific progress seems to be in trying different models specifically around balancing the CO~2~ from rerouting.

I just don't think that's really worth highlighting here. Many flight aggregators (like Googles) already take contrails into account:

https://support.google.com/travel/answer/11116147

Condensation trails (contrails) form when an aircraft flies through regions of high humidity. Water vapor in the air condenses around tiny soot particles in the aircraft’s exhaust and then freezes, forming line-shaped cloud trails.

Most contrails dissipate quickly, but for a small fraction of flights, atmospheric conditions align to produce contrails that persist and spread out, trapping heat in the atmosphere. These persistent contrails account for about a third of aviation’s total warming impact, making the full climate effect from flying substantially higher than fuel-based CO₂ estimates alone.[Lee, 2021. CO2e/GWP100].

Predicting and attributing contrail warming potential to single flights at the time of booking is difficult. This is because weather and atmospheric conditions are hard to forecast accurately in advance and most contrail warming impact comes from only a small number of flights. However, Google has partnered with leading scientists and aviation experts to develop flight-level contrail impact models. This makes it possible to surface these estimates directly in Google Flights.

Each flight on Google Flights includes a contrail impact estimate, visible in the flight details. This shows the potential predicted warming effect of contrails relative to the flight’s estimated CO₂ emissions

this post was submitted on 25 Nov 2025
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