The airline industry has been always the subject of criticism for inadequate cabin waste recycling, which threatens the sector’s environmental reputation. With a huge growth in passenger numbers expected in the coming decade, the volume of cabin waste could more than double in the next 10 years!
This certainly calls for urgent action towards proper cabin waste recycling across the global airline industry.
A growing challenge for airlines, however, is the sustainable management of millions of tonnes of waste generated within the cabin. Cabin waste is costing airlines money, consuming valuable resources, and undermining the sector’s credibility on sustainable operations.
Cabin waste is made up of two main streams: Cleaning waste and catering (galley) waste.
Cleaning waste is leftover rubbish from items given to passengers on the aircraft such as newspapers, paper towels, plastic bottles, food dropped on the floor, amenity kits and plastic wrapping from blankets, pillows and headsets. Cleaning waste also includes the contents of washroom bins and medical waste such as used syringes.
Catering waste comes from inflight meals, snacks and beverages served to passengers and can consist of leftover food, drinks and packaging which is placed back in the trolleys, in static or compactor bins. This waste can contain high volumes of liquid from unconsumed beverages and ice.
Increasingly, airlines are taking steps to address the issue and good practices are emerging within the sector.
An industry research done by the global body of airlines – IATA indicates that 20-25% of cabin waste is untouched food and beverages and although the inflight catering market shrank during the pandemic. This still means the sector is incinerating or landfilling $2-3bn worth of resources.
The in-flight catering services market, IATA says is expected to have reached a market size of $18bn by 2021.
A unique challenge for airlines that operate on international routes is the complex waste regulatory environment that they have to work with. International catering wastes are often subject to regulatory inspections and special handling and disposal requirements including incineration and steam sterilisation, which makes reuse and recycling challenging (if not impossible).
Despite airline meals being prepared under strict global hygiene controls including the sourcing of ingredients, countries such as Australia, Canada, members of the European Union, New Zealand and the US have placed restrictions on catering waste from international flights based on animal health concerns.
Although international arrivals into these countries represent only a fraction of total global arrivals, tight turnaround times, lack of space in catering facilities and the adoption of a precautionary approach by service providers, means that catering wastes from domestic or non-regulated international flights are often not segregated and all cabin waste is deemed potentially biohazardous.
All cabin waste is subject to national waste management controls that limit pollution, but many countries have gone further with their regulations, introducing restrictions on catering waste from international flights to protect their agricultural sector (in respect to animal health).
Airline meals are prepared using stringent hygiene and quality control standards, originally designed for Nasa astronauts, but the regulations often lead to the incineration of all cabin waste with limited ability to reuse and recycle.
Another key challenge for airlines is the inappropriate disposal of single use plastic (SUP) and its impact on the marine environment.
Although SUP is widely used in aviation due to its strength, lightness and hygienic properties, voluntary action by airlines has demonstrated that the sector is keen to replace these products with more sustainable alternatives.
However, international airlines are facing challenges with differing SUP regulations being implemented at airport, regional and national levels, an IATA session in Doha was told last month.
Asymmetric SUP regulations will result in differing alternative products being introduced on separate legs of a journey, confusing passengers and crew, increasing compliance costs and generating more waste.
These emerging regulations do not recognise that alternatives to SUP must meet strict aviation security and hygiene constraints and that replacement should be based on a lifecycle approach that takes emissions from flight operations into account.
IATA has also identified asymmetric national SUP bans that are problematic for international airlines, and are raising awareness of these concerns with the relevant regulators.
Many airlines, the association says, have taken a proactive approach to the challenge of SUP by removing straws and drink stirrers and introducing bio-based cutlery, crockery and packaging solutions.
However, in some countries these initiatives have either been stalled or reversed as a result of the pandemic and the introduction of asymmetric regulations.
Industry experts say airlines and their catering providers have an opportunity to reduce cabin wastes by improving planning and logistics.
Regulations by certain countries on treating cabin waste, they argue, reduce the sector’s ability to help build a circular economy and contribute to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) target to cut global food waste in half by 2030.
A major obstacle to airlines’ ability to reuse and recycle more cabin waste is the International Catering Waste (ICW) legislation that many governments have adopted. These regulations aim to reduce the risk of transferring animal and plant diseases by requiring ICW to be subject to special treatment.
For this reason, airlines and their service providers must work collaboratively with regulators to ensure that aviation makes a positive contribution to the SDG target.
Source: Civil Aviation Authority – Qatar