NASA Aeronautics has always been about improving aviation efficiency and safety, while reducing noise, fuel use and harmful emissions. For decades, NASA-developed technologies have contributed to making aviation more sustainable – environmentally and economically. Now NASA is expanding research for sustainable aviation by developing and testing new green technologies and designs for next-generation aircraft, new automation tools for greener and safer airspace operations, and new sustainable energy options for aircraft propulsion. NASA is partnering with industry, academia, and other agencies through the Sustainable Flight National Partnership to accomplish aviation’s aggressive climate change agenda – reduce aviation carbon emissions by half by 2050 (compared to 2005), and achieve net-zero emissions by 2060. 

Through its University Leadership Initiative, NASA is aiming to help address the long-term challenge of Zero Emission Aviation by 2050, focusing beyond the next generation aircraft and pioneering new concepts, technologies, and operations to achieve a zero-emissions future. In this case, zero emission technology refers to any technology that provides a pathway to the eventual adoption of aircraft that do no environmental harm in all its operating modes. The focus is specifically on reducing aviation emissions and not target emissions from energy production.