Air France to help Honeywell develop new electric green taxiing system

ETW STAFF – Mumbai

Honeywell and Safran have announced that they are extending their collaboration on the development of the new electric green taxiing system (EGTS) to include Air France. The MoU signed will enable Air France to analyse the potential technical, operational and financial benefits of the EGTS. In turn, Air France will provide valuable assistance to Safran and Honeywell in refining estimated savings of the system and quantifying other operational benefits.

Air France’s aircraft utilise a number of heavily used airports, and the EGTS can provide a decisive economic advantage at these airports, while also reducing emissions and noise in the terminal environment. From early analysis Air France expects to save the equivalent of several per cent fuel burn per cycle based on its current operations, for its fleet of 120 plus short and medium range aircraft.

Thanks to these substantial fuel savings, a single aisle aircraft equipped with the EGTS system also reduces NOx emissions by approximately 50 per cent and carbon emissions by approximately 75 per cent during taxiing maneuvers. Honeywell and Safran are targeting EGTS entry into service on new aircraft in 2016, shortly followed by a retrofit option on existing aircraft.

Brian Wenig, EGTS Program VP, Honeywell Aerospace said, “Having major international carriers such as Air France join us in maturing EGTS is very important — as with the rest of our portfolios voice of the customer feedback plays a very significant part in our product development process, ensuring that when we bring the system to market end customers already recognise it as a viable system for dramatically reducing fuel consumption and lowering operational costs.”