Countdown to Last Paper Ticket – 100 days until 100% ET
Paper air flight tickets will soon be a thing of the past. On June 1, 2008 the IATA will achieve 100% electronic ticketing, according to Giovanni Bisignani, IATA’s Director General and CEO.
Bisignani: “E-ticketing is the flagship project of Simplifying the Business. While a paper ticket costs US$10 to process, e-ticketing reduces that cost to US$1. The industry will save over US$3 billion each year by offering the passenger a better service. There is no better win-win proposition.”
E-tickets also, obviously, cut down on the amount of trees harvested and waste generated by paper tickets. Before Simplifying the Business started in June 2004, 28 million paper tickets were issued each month. That number has been reduced to less than 3 million a month. Soon zero a month. Keep up the good work, IATA!
see also: IATA/Solar Impulse Partnership
Bertrand Piccard, a Swiss adventurer and the first person to circle the globe non-stop in a hot air balloon, is looking for more funding to build his “SolarImpulse” plane, which he believes can fly day and night with no fuel or emissions. A partnership has been announced between the Solar Impulse project and the International Air Transport Association (IATA). IATA, which represents about 240 airlines, has set a target of achieving the technology to fly with zero carbon emissions within the next 50 years.
MSNBC: “The craft will have a wingspan of 262.5 feet — slightly wider than that of the giant new Airbus A380, the world’s largest passenger plane. The large wings will provide maximum surface area for the solar cells that will power the craft.”
links:
Adventurer seeks more solar plane funds
IATA’s Carbon Free Vision (pdf)
