The Air Force has ordered its pilots to fly higher and slower in an effort to slash fuel use while still performing the same missions.
The rise in oil prices has added $1 billion to the cost of fueling the Air Force fleet in 2012, deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force for energy Kevin Geiss said last month.
“We use the most energy of all the services in the Department of Defense, and we are the largest energy user in the federal government,” Geiss said. “Every day, we fly 900 mobility aircraft flights around the world moving cargo and fuel and doing disaster response and aeromedical evacuation as well as operations with combat aircraft.”
The Air Force fleet of 4,693 aircraft is twice as large as the fleets of commercial carriers UPS, Southwest, United and Delta combined, he said.
One way that the Air Force plans to cut fuel costs is by installing fuel-efficient engines on some of its aircraft. For example, upgrading engines on KC-130 tankers at a cost of $278 million over several years will ultimately save $1.3 billion in maintenance and $150 million in fuel over the life of the aircraft through to 2046, Geiss said.
Other fuel-efficiency efforts are already having a big impact. The Air Force is hauling 27 percent more cargo than it did five years ago, but its fuel consumption has fallen 4 percent since 2006. The cost to haul a ton of cargo one mile, made up mostly of the cost of fuel, has been cut 21 percent, Geiss said.
“We are looking at changing how we fly,” he said.
The Air Force saved $2.4 million last year by optimizing diplomatic clearances to allow aircraft to fly over friendly nations’ airspace and cut flight times, he said.
