Environment Report

Download the entire 2016 Environment Report

Our products are at home in the skies, but they’re built on the ground. Naturally, we have a deep commitment to using the technology and innovation we’re known for to benefit the environment.

We’re developing and testing new technologies that will bring greater fuel efficiency and environmentally progressive innovations to our customers and our communities around the world. We’re meeting environmental performance targets for our facilities while ramping up commercial airplane production. And we’re using innovative approaches in cleanup efforts as part of our remediation program.

Boeing is leading local and global collaboration for the complex challenges our world faces now, and looking to the future. We support industry-wide approaches to align on ways to improve the environment. And whether it’s through the development of sustainable aviation biofuel or by working with communities globally on important environmental issues, we’re making a difference.

From working to improve the environmental performance of our products and services to working together for the benefit of our homes and communities, Boeing is building a better planet.

Environment Report Executive Summary

Commercial Aviation

Commercial Aviation and the Environment

Because air travel helps drive economic growth and prosperity and brings the people of the world closer together, Boeing and the aviation industry are growing. And as air travel expands around the world, Boeing is taking a leadership role to continue to reduce aviation’s environmental impact by reducing fuel use, greenhouse gas emissions and noise. This benefits our customers, their passengers, our employees and the planet.

Boeing also has a comprehensive environmental strategy that includes:

Designing and building more fuel-efficient airplanes
Improving gate-to-gate operational efficiency for customers
Advocating for modernized air traffic management systems
Developing sustainable aviation biofuel
Reducing Boeing’s environmental footprint

Today’s airplanes are already 70 percent more fuel efficient and 90 percent quieter than the first jets. To make further progress, more than 75 percent of Boeing’s commercial research and development funding supports greater efficiency and environmental performance in our products, services and facilities.

Boeing Commercial Airplanes and the Environment

The Boeing ecoDemonstrator Program

Boeing and Sustainable Aviation Biofuel Development

Boeing named Eco-Company of the Year by Air Transport World

Improving Environmental Performance Through Innovation

Research & Innovation

Boeing Research & Technology’s technicians, technologists, engineers and scientists collaborate with partners around the world to solve environmental challenges.

As the advanced central research and development organization of The Boeing Company, Boeing Research & Technology (BR&T) provides innovative technologies that enable the development of future aerospace solutions while improving the cost, quality, efficiency and performance of Boeing products.

This includes finding innovative solutions around the world to improve environmental performance.

From researching biofuels, fuel cells and hybrid electric propulsion to improving air traffic management, finding sustainable composite materials and exploring new chemical coatings that resist corrosion, our team of technicians, technologists, engineers and scientists collaborate with research and development partners around the world to solve today and tomorrow’s environmental challenges.

Boeing Research & Technology has also partnered and contracted with the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in researching both next generation and futuristic technologies and concepts that could make aerospace products more environmentally efficient.

Remediation

Each year, thousands of people visit Santa Susana in Simi Valley, Calif., to learn more about the site’s important place in history and experience firsthand its beauty and biodiversity.

Boeing’s remediation program is focused on using innovative approaches in cleanup efforts to ensure the protection of human health and the environment, coupled with the use of invaluable input from community members and environmental groups. This, combined with the guidance of leading environmental scientists and federal and state regulatory agencies, has led to great progress in cleaning up remediation sites. Boeing also often collaborates with wildlife and conservation organizations to restore habitat for the benefit of wildlife and the community.

Duwamish Waterway

Santa Susana