United Airlines and Wyndham Worldwide are launching a program to reduce carbon emissions associated with corporate air travel.
   Wyndham has agreed to become the launch partner for United's Eco-Skies CarbonChoice corporate carbon offset program. The program enables the airline's corporate customers to track and offset the emissions stemming from their business travel and freight shipments on United at the enterprise level.
   United is the only U.S. airline offering a corporate carbon offset program says Angela Foster-Rice, managing director - Environmental Affairs & Sustainability at United Airlines.
   “This program underscores United's efforts to lead commercial aviation as an environmentally responsible company,” Foster-Rice said.
   The offset program uses actual flight level data, recognizing aircraft type, routes, fuel consumption, payload, and customer-specific business travel and cargo shipments on United.
   The offsets are available through United's partnership with global NGO Sustainable Travel International.
   It reminds us of a song . . .
   Click to listen.

Two In View . . . EVA Air takes off from the Songshan Airport as contrails reveal another commercial airplane above Taipei, Taiwan, on Sunday July 26.

     It may come as little surprise that just like many of Asia’s leading airlines, cargo revenues account for a major percentage of EVA Air’s income—on average about 30 percent of total operating revenue.
     Therefore, when talking routes and the future at EVA, much of the carrier’s focus is on the transpacific trade.
     “For EVA Cargo, Asia-North America is more prominent than Asia-Europe due to the facts of geographic site, trade patterns, as well as higher operating profit,” said a spokesperson.
     “In addition to operating 18 weekly freighter services into North America, we keep exploring all the possibilities to increase passenger frequencies—Seattle flights were increased to daily, Toronto and Vancouver are planned to be increased to 5 week, etc. Overall, North America flights will be increased from 55 weekly flights to 63 at the end of 2015.”
     The Taiwan-based carrier, part of the Evergreen Group that also includes one of the world’s leading container shipping lines, operates a total of 71 aircraft including fifty-four passenger jets, eight 747-400 freighters, and six MD-11 freighters.

New Aircraft

     The news earlier in July that EVA reaffirmed its commitment to its cargo operations by signing purchase agreements for a further five Boeing 777 freighters—the first of which is due for delivery October 2017 with the rest due to enter service by September 2019—speaks for itself.
     The new freighters will see the gradual phase out of some of the airline’s B747-400Fs.
     “We are determined to make EVA the world’s best airline for both passenger and cargo services,” said EVA Air Chairman K.W. Chang, noting that cargo remains an important link in global trade and investing in the latest aircraft was central to the airline’s strategic vision.

The Vision Thing

     “Certainly, EVA has a clear strategy for its cargo operations,” a source told FlyingTypers.
     “Taking advantage of lower fuel prices, EVA adjusts routes and long-term plans to produce maximum profit, and makes full use of its ample passenger bellyhold capacity to accommodate customer demands,” the source added.
     Last year the airline carried 680,000 tons of cargo, achieving a load factor of 85 percent.
     “The total cargo revenue was USD $1 billion, which declined by 2.4 percent year-on-year,” EVA the aircraft order release noted.
     “Actual flown ton kilometers was 4,777,094,129.”
     Everyone knows at this point volumes in late 2014 and during much of 2013 received a substantial boost due to the U.S. West Coast port labor dispute, which saw major shortages of equipment and congestion at sea and inland build up, prompting many shippers to rely more heavily on air freight solutions.
     “In the first months of 2015, due to U.S. West Coast congestion and the urgent demand for auto parts, the strongest lanes were from Asia to USA,” EVA declared.
     “The dispute has now been solved and the market volume and yield have returned to normal.”
     EVA noted that core export business from Taiwan was focused on various cargoes including electrical goods, garments, fabrics, food stuffs, fashion items, medical supplies, car parts, and accessories. Telecommunications equipment and miscellaneous manufactured articles are also a mainstay for EVA.

What’s Up Ahead?

     As Summer 2015 continues EVA predicts higher demand in the future for panels, auto parts, set-top boxes and solar energy equipment as on-line purchasing and trading boosted express parcel and airmail traffic demand.
     EVA declares the cool chain is also a focus for the carrier. EVA Cargo launched a new pharma service in April in collaboration with Envirotainer. EVA Pharmacare uses the latter’s active temperature-controlled containers for air cargo on a rent-it-when-you-need-it-basis, focused on high value goods such as biologicals, pharmaceuticals, vaccines, healthcare products, high-end food stuffs, and high-tech semi-conductor components.
     The first wave of the service was aimed at the Europe and Asia markets including Amsterdam (SPL), Paris (CDG), Vienna (VIE), Taipei (TPE), Bangkok (BKK) and Singapore (SIN) and the service was extended to London (LHR) and North America at the start of June.
     However, despite the carrier’s recent investments and product launches, freight operators faced multiple challenges.
     “We observe that the global cargo market landscape has evolved over the last five years due to a number of factors,” EVA told FlyingTypers.
     “More goods are transported intermodally. Bellyhold capacities have grown.
     “Electronic products have become smaller and thinner as demand for the kind of capacity provided by full-cargo freighters has fallen.
     “We continue to accommodate these trends by adjusting our freighter fleet and long-term plans,” EVA said.
SkyKing

    UPS says it is expanding its local solution to 8,000 locations and to 22,000 worldwide by the end of 2015 for consumers and small businesses that need convenient access to UPS.
    “We listened to consumers who said they were not buying online because they didn’t have a secure delivery location,” said Alan Gershenhorn, UPS executive vice president and chief commercial officer. “By providing local options, we are improving the e-commerce delivery experience, which helps retailers and UPS.”
    UPS “Access Point” locations offer package pickup and drop off. Locations are local businesses, primarily neighborhood convenience and grocery stores, dry cleaners, and delicatessens with extended evening and weekend hours.
    All 4,400 The UPS Store locations throughout the U.S. are also part of the network.

    Always innovative, Finnair remains atop the Nordic carriers in total annual air cargo throughput and has just added Luton to its European freighter network, which includes Helsinki and Brussels via a cooperation with IAG for AY A300-600 main deck services.
Antti Kuusenmäki, VP, Head of Finnair Cargo, likes the new connection.
    “This partnership with IAG Cargo offers our customers considerably improved connections between Asia and the UK, and adds great new connections for our service partners between our Nordic home market, North America, and Asia."
    AY is operating additional seasonal service to both Chicago and Toronto for the summer season.
    The Chicago route is flown with Airbus A330 (belly) on Mondays, Thursdays, and Saturdays.
    The Toronto route opened on June 14 and featured A330 flights operated on Tuesdays, Fridays, and Sundays.

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