Oneworld alliance carriers serving San Francisco have provisionally agreed to purchase blended sustainable aviation fuel from specialist Aemetis, which is developing a facility in California. Under the deal, which has yet to be finalised, the airlines will collectively take 350m gallons of the fuel from the company from 2024. The blend comprises 40% sustainable fuel and 60% petroleum-based jet fuel. Delivery will continue for an initial seven-year term. Oneworld is aiming for 10% sustainable fuel use across its member carriers by 2030. It says member airlines put forward a joint request for proposals from fuel suppliers, and claims this amounts to the “first such effort” by a global alliance to purchase sustainable fuel. CE Rob Gurney says the tentative agreement “underlines the importance of collaboration” to advance environmental sustainability. Several Oneworld carriers – among them American Airlines, Japan Airlines, British Airways and Qatar Airways – serve San Francisco, and the alliance says other member airlines could join the initiative.<br/>
oneworld
Hong Kong’s Cathay Pacific Airways has maintained a strong liquidity position at a time when the impact of the Omicron variant of COVID-19 on travel demand remains unclear, a senior executive said on Wednesday. The airline said its liquidity of HK$31.7b ($4.07b) as of Oct. 31 was only slightly down on HK$32.8b at June 30 due largely to a strong performance in the air cargo business. “It is too early to assess the impact on travel demand,” Cathay Chief Customer and Commercial Officer Ronald Lam said of the Omicron variant in an analysts’ briefing. Cathay last month said it expected its second-half results to improve considerably from the first half, though it still forecast a substantial loss for the full year. The airline continues to suffer from COVID-19 pandemic-related travel restrictions, operating at only 10% of pre-pandemic passenger capacity in October and posting a 97.2% decline in passenger numbers from 2019.<br/>
Cathay Pacific has been hit by a wave of pilot resignations in recent weeks as resentment over Hong Kong's strict quarantine regime boils over and crew scramble for emerging opportunities overseas. The departures come as Hong Kong ties itself to Beijing's closed-border zero-Covid strategy -- a move that has kept the city coronavirus-free but internationally isolated. Hong Kong's leaders say normalising travel with China must come before the rest of the world, a strategy that has caused growing alarm within multinationals in a finance hub that dubs itself "Asia's World City". AFP interviewed four Cathay pilots who requested anonymity. Each said they knew more than a dozen colleagues who had resigned in the last few weeks. More were applying for jobs at rivals in places that have shifted to a strategy of learning to live with the virus, they added. "Things are horrible, resignations are through the roof," one pilot, who has more than 20 years' flying experience and has applied to two rival airlines, told AFP. "There are a lot of guys at their breaking point. It's actually amazing that we haven't had an accident yet."<br/>