A Qatar Airways flight from London, Gatwick to Doha made history by being the first to use fuel derived from natural gas. The A340-600 aircraft used a mixture of synthetic Gas to Liquids (GTL) kerosene and conventional oil based kerosene. The GTL blend produces less emissions and sulphur dioxide.
A consortium of companies developed the fuel over the past few years – Qatar Airways, Airbus, Qatar Petroleum, Rolls Royce, Qatar Science and Technology Park, Shell and WOQOD. Chief executive officer for Qatar Airways, Akbar Al Baker, said “Qatar Airways is proud to be associated with this consortium and to become the world’s first airline to use this new fuel technology on a commercial passenger flight.”