{"id":12861,"date":"2016-11-04T17:03:01","date_gmt":"2016-11-04T21:03:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/digital.hbs.edu\/platform-rctom\/submission\/dragons-in-the-sky-somewhere-between-sao-paulo-and-rio\/"},"modified":"2016-11-04T17:06:31","modified_gmt":"2016-11-04T21:06:31","slug":"dragons-in-the-sky-somewhere-between-sao-paulo-and-rio","status":"publish","type":"hck-submission","link":"https:\/\/d3.harvard.edu\/platform-rctom\/submission\/dragons-in-the-sky-somewhere-between-sao-paulo-and-rio\/","title":{"rendered":"Dragons in the Sky \u2013 somewhere between Sao Paulo and Rio"},"content":{"rendered":"

What flies and spits fire at the same time? That\u2019s right: airplanes.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Aircraft are major emitters of greenhouse gasses and reducing these emissions poses a challenge to airlines, regulators, and manufacturers. How will Brazilian aircraft manufacturer Embraer react to this changing environment? What steps have they taken to become more eco-friendly and not be left behind in this new competitive scenario?<\/p>\n

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Why should we care about airplanes?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"flying<\/p>\n

If you ever hopped on a plane and flown across the world to go on that perfect vacation, I\u2019m sorry to tell you that flying probably accounts for a relevant part of your carbon footprint. The average American will generate 19 tons of CO2 in a year [2] \u2013 the worldwide average is about 5 tons per year [3], whereas flying round-trip from New York to Europe will generate an effect equivalent to 2 to 3 tons of CO2 per passenger [2]. Commercial flights alone are estimated to produce 700 million tons of CO2 per year [1] \u2013 about 2% of total world emissions.<\/p>\n

Current levels of emissions originated from flying are high, but estimates are that this number could triple by 2050 [4]. Specific studies point out that the temperature increase caused by aviation alone could be of 0.03o<\/sup>C by 2050 [6]. It comes as no surprise, then, that governments and international agencies have already started suggesting and enforcing regulations on greenhouse gas emissions from airplanes [4] [5].<\/p>\n

In a world where emissions are controlled and regulated, aircraft manufacturers that fail to adapt to the new reality might be headed for disaster. On the flipside, producing \u201cgreener\u201d planes will provide an edge over their competitors. Companies can achieve that in basically two ways:<\/p>\n