Fuel efficiency and tankering

[Edward Terry]

Here is an excellent article for anyone interested in the numbers side of fuel efficiency.

A question for the big plane drivers: to what extent does your company tanker fuel these days to cut costs?

[Chris Tully]

You will find that a great deal of domestic flights by Jetstar and Virgin are tankering flights.

It is cheaper to purchase fuel from main ports like Sydney/Melbourne through a supplier with large purchases (multiple aircraft on a daily basis i.e. a sharp negotiated price) then it is to buy from the local tanker at a small regional port.

Although it is not always possible due landing weight limits, performance limitations etc.

[Radi K]

VB only tanker into about 4 or 5 ports. Not a major winner for the company due to sector length and delta burn.

[Chris Roope]

On the 767 network the only port we routinely tanker into is Noumea.
There has to be a fairly significant difference in the cost of fuel for it to be worth the additional fuel burn of tankering fuel in.

[Adrian B]

Having just come back from there, I can understand why the tanker to Noumea. whilst I dont know what aviation fuel is worth, reg unleaded was around @2.50 per litre.

[Robert Zweck]

Hmm,

I wonder why some B737s out of Adelaide to Melbourne would carry 8 tonnes for a burn off of 2.5 tonnes?

On a beaut sunny day with no holding .

[Nicholas Togias]

737 fuel policy for a certain airline includes obviously the trip fuel, fixed fuel reserve, variable fuel reserve, taxi fuel, margin fuel and some more fuel - forgot what that is called, some fuel that is needed incase of an engine failure to allow for sufficient reserves ...

the above I've mentioned is all non-ETOPS on a good day (so bar alternate fuel etc). I also calculated approx. how much fuel you'd need according to this policy (again on a good day) and it is about 6300 kg, but I'm sure the pilots would add a bit more!

Hope this helped!