Virgin expands lightweight container fleet
02 / 03 / 2015
Virgin Atlantic Cargo has taken delivery of its first 802 lightweight air cargo containers and will add a further 250 new units in the coming weeks.
The investment is part of the carrier’s sustainability programme to save fuel and reduce its carbon footprint
The airline will ultimately replace all 3,200 of its LD3 units. The first phase of its new composite container fleet will enable Virgin Atlantic to achieve further fuel efficiencies and reduce its CO² emissions by an additional 565 tons in 2014.
Neil Ferdinando, Virgin Atlantic’s general manager cargo operations, said: “We have been trialling lightweight containers over several months and with the first delivery we have replaced 25 per cent of our LD3s with composite containers that are 16 kilos per unit lighter.
“This provides a dual benefit to the airline of improved fuel consumption and makes another valuable contribution towards our target of reducing aircraft CO² emissions by 30 per cent by 2020.”
Virgin Atlantic is sourcing its lightweight containers from Nordisk and Advanced Composite Structures (ACS).
