Updated on January 05, 2026, 4:37:54 PM
Fuel Efficiency programs don’t always stick… What’s failing is not a lack of skill or technical knowledge of pilots. What’s missing are the conditions, tools, culture, and support that make these practices feel feasible, meaningful, and recognized.
Here are 10 key of understanding and how to handle them: 10 reasons and how to improve
1. Pilot don’t feel heard or involved
Pilots understand operational constraints better than anyone. When a fuel initiative is created without their input, it can feel theoretical, incomplete, or disconnected from reality.
✔️ Involve pilots early in your airline’s fuel efficiency program.
Make fuel efficiency a collaborative, airline-wide initiative. Everyone should be involved: flight operations, dispatch, maintenance, ground operations, and pilots.
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Involve pilots early in the fuel efficiency journey to help shape procedures, and create a feedback loop once the program is launched. Build a cross-functional fuel team including chief pilots and pilot representatives.
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Treat fuel efficiency as a shared initiative, not a top-down policy.
Designing procedures hand-in-hand with pilots naturally leads to better adoption, because the program reflects the airline’s specific operational needs and the reality in the cockpit.
2. Fear of running against safety
Fuel efficiency must never be perceived as competing with safety.
If pilots feel pressured, they will reject the practice outright, and rightfully so.
✔️ Keep in mind that efficiency will never harm safety, but on the contrary, can improve it.
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Clearly state that fuel efficiency only applies when safe and allowed by conditions. If you respect that, increased efficiency creates safety margins.
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By sharing data on how to fly more efficiently, you empower them to make better decisions, and this benefits to safety as well as to their job’s interest.
3. Data provided is not accurate
Generic, averaged, or delayed data breaks credibility. Pilots rely on precision. If the figures don’t reflect reality, the entire program loses legitimacy.
✔️Provide accurate data to pilots.
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You need to measure all the potential fuel initiatives. These computations must be done on every single flight, based on actual conditions. If you want your pilots to trust your fuel savings analysis, do not use statistical values.
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Showing trustworthy figures to pilots will help them understand the importance of each initiative, and they will be glad to use the data that helps them perform better.
More about it here: Understand why accuracy is essential to earn pilot’s trust
4. Flight plans are not accurate
If the flight plan doesn’t match real conditions, pilots will override it and deprioritize efficiency measures. A more accurate flight plan is a gold mine for your pilots. It helps them save time, be more precise, and be more efficient.
✔️ Control the flight plan accuracy.
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Check your flight plan’s accuracy: wind, weights, fuel reserves. If it is good, show it to your pilots.
5. Lack of practical knowledge channels
Pilots lack a trusted, pilot-centric channel to gather actionable, operational knowledge about fuel efficiency, sustainability, and the evolving demands of modern aviation.
A lack of understanding can lead to mistrust.
✔️ Provide insights, not lessons.
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Empower all pilots with facts, tools, and recognition to be better at what they do.
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Offer clear, fact-based information that pilots can use at their discretion to fine-tune efficiency.
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Focus on tangible outcomes: saving fuel, CO2, so they understand the fuel impact of operational choices
Pilots gain data and tools to stay at the forefront of operational excellence. Some resource center, like the OpenAirlines Academy could help heads of flight operations and chief pilots foster a stronger culture of fuel savings and strengthen pilots’ understanding of fuel efficiency principles,
6. Concerns about data privacy
Some pilots may feel the system is judging or spying on their performance. If pilots believe data is being used to monitor or rank them, they disengage.
✔️ What to do
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Be explicit about what data is collected and why.
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If you need to restrict this data, only ~50 QAR parameters (out of one thousand available) are key to run all the analysis; share the list with the pilots.
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Discuss the matter with the unions and set up a protocol that explains what are the intentions and legitimates the use of the data.
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If pilots have additional concerns, clarify with them how data will be anonymized.
The fuel efficiency project’s objectives are not to control and monitor pilots’ actions but to identify opportunities on all operated flights.
7. Too much change at once
Rolling out several initiatives simultaneously can create fatigue and confusion.
✔️ Start with quick-wins
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Start with quick-wins. It is always better to start with a low effort. The engagement will be higher if what you ask does not need too much effort.
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Increase complexity only once confidence and adoption grow. As culture and practices improve, everybody will be glad to move to more sophisticated practices.
8. Ineffective Onboarding
Cultural shifts happen through champions, make sure to have them with you befire concidering a mass rollout.
✔️ Onboard pilots in several steps.
Onboard pilots in several steps:
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It is simpler to have the first discussions with a small representative group of pilots. How this group is setup should be discussed directly with your chief pilots and the pilots’ representatives.
It is a good way to stay focused and be able to listen and answer everyone’s concerns. Once this first group is onboarded, they will become your early promoters. -
Scale once the message and process are validated.
9. Progress are not celebrated
If improvement isn’t communicated and encouraged, motivation fades.
✔️ Share measurable results to help pilots progress.
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Share measurable results and global KPIs progress. When you start to measure general performance, investigate your past initiatives, and check the real benefit of these initiatives. Accurate results and actual performance are the best starts to launch new actions.
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Show the pilots their own results: the more you empower your pilots, the most efficient they will be. When they improve their performance, they must see and trust this improvement.
Here is an interesting article that may help you have a first idea of the potential ROI you can expect to get.
10. Everything seams complicated
Keep it simple! Pilots already manage procedures, checklists, communication, and workload. Efficiency practices must be simple, intuitive, and easy to apply.
When you set up your fuel initiatives, you will find many specificities and Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) to consider. You will be tempted to fine-tune your procedures to increase your fuel savings. It might be a bad idea.
✔️ Keep it simple!
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Create training sessions to familiarize them with the procedures.
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Reinforce through feedback loops, not instructions.
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Keep it simple! If you keep the message simple, it will be better heard and followed.
The issue isn’t that pilots don’t know how to save fuel, it’s that they don’t always have the context, feedback, or organizational backing to turn knowledge into consistent action.
Your role, as an ops or fuel manager, is to remove friction and empower pilots with the clarity and resources they need to operate efficiently and sustainably.
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