Our superjumbo will save the planet, Airbus says

LE BOURGET, France, June 19 (Reuters) Airbus attempted a green-friendly makeover of its A380 superjumbo on Tuesday, saying the world's largest airliner could save the planet.

Rapidly growing pressure to deliver cleaner planes is one of the main talking points at the Paris air show, as the industry hears public calls to tackle greenhouse emissions even while arguing jet travel is far from the worst offender.

Pressure came to a head at a meeting of global airlines lobby IATA earlier this month, when executives recognised they were losing the PR battle and set a challenge to jetmakers to go green.

Airbus's top executives began referring to the A380 as a ''gentle giant'' on the eve of the world's largest air show this week and issued a brochure describing the benefits to the environment of the quiet and efficient 555-seat plane.

But the company's sales chief John Leahy went a step further, heading one section of a presentation: ''Saving the planet, one A380 at a time''.

Airbus says the A380 can fly more passengers further and more fuel-efficiently than any previous jet, resulting in lower carbon dioxide emissions per passenger.

Airbus marketers have previously coined a long list of superlatives for the A380 which staged its inaugural flight in 2005, but have never before so clearly stated its green ambitions.

Leahy, an American credited for propelling Airbus into top spot against Boeing before it hit problems last year, is renowned for his fluent sales patter but even he has not so far been able to repair the A380's problems.

The programme is running two years late after difficulties blamed indirectly on Franco-German tensions in Airbus and will not reach its first customer Singapore Airlines until December.

That prompted one British defence analyst to note that the gentle giant's biggest contribution to the environment so far had been to sit in the firm's hangars with its engines off.

On its Website Airbus says the A380 burns 17 per cent less fuel per seat than rival large aircraft and produces only 75g of CO2 per passenger/kilometre, which it says is almost half of the target set by the European Union for cars manufactured in 2008.

Yet a draft United Nations report in April cited the transport sector as a black spot in the fight against global warming, saying surging use of cars and planes will push up greenhouse gas emissions in coming decades.

The report said 2 percent of carbon dioxide emissions come from aviation but emissions were likely to rise 3 to 4 percent a year because traffic growth of 5 percent will outpace efficiency gains of 1 to 2 percent.

REUTERS SRS DB2101