An extraordinary spectacle of aircraft Contrails forming Contrail Cirrus clouds viewed over central Cornwall UK. Commercial aircraft jet engines cruising at around 30,000 feet lay Ice vapour trails to create a sky born lattice which in turn causes the effect of "radiation forcing". This white fluffy cloud effect blocks the earth radiating heat back into space by reflection. In addition to the CO2 released from the jet fuel which will last centuries the short term but equally damaging effect from contrails has been proven to be mostly avoidable. Research released by Roger Teoh of Imperial college London Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, propose making only small altitude changes, could significantly reduce the effect of contrails on global warming.
Taking into account the congestion in the airspace above Japan, the team simulated these planes to fly either 2,000 feet higher or lower than their actual flight paths and found that the contrail climate forcing could be cut by 59 per cent by altering the altitudes of 1.7 per cent of flights.
The diversion in flight paths caused less than a tenth of a per cent increase in fuel consumption - but, the researchers say, the reduced contrail formation more than offset the CO2 released by the extra fuel.

Dr Stettler suggests that their method of targeting only the few flights that cause the most climate forcing is the best way to avoid hikes in CO2 emissions. He said: “We’re conscious that any additional CO2 released into the atmosphere will have a climate impact stretching centuries into the future, so we’ve also calculated that if we only target flights that wouldn’t emit extra CO­2, we can still achieve a 20 per cent reduction in contrail forcing.”

The study’s first author, Roger Teoh, also of Imperial’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, said: “Our simulation shows that targeting the few flights that cause the most harmful contrails, as well as making only small altitude changes, could significantly reduce the effect of contrails on global warming.”

Industry impact

The researchers say aircraft engines themselves also play a part in how harmful contrails are. Black carbon particles are produced by incomplete fuel combustion, so new, more efficient engine combustion technology could help to reduce them by around 70 per cent.
This, combined with small altitude changes, could help reduce overall contrail harm by around 90 per cent. Meanwhile Cornwall watches, waits and wonders.