Did you know you could save up to $75 million annually through fuel efficiency? Despite this potential, many airlines continue to delay taking action. Reasons often include competing priorities, resource constraints, and uncertainty about where to start. But waiting isn’t just postponing costs, it’s actively costing your airline, both in missed savings and reduced profitability.
This article tackles the financial consequences of delaying a fuel efficiency strategy. It quantifies daily missed savings using a typical narrow-body fleet example and shows how operational improvements unlock significant and fast-returning value, without aircraft modification. For executives seeking to improve margins and build resilience, fuel efficiency is an opportunity with immediate payoff.
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📊Summary The cost of waiting: why delaying fuel efficiency action costs airlines
Fuel efficiency opportunity: where the savings are
Bottom line |
Fuel is the single largest variable operating cost for airlines. It accounts for 25.5% of total operational expenses in North America1. This varies depending on route network, fleet composition, and global oil prices. The scale of spending on fuel is enormous, with global airlines spending $291 billion on jet fuel in 20242, a significant increase compared to previous years.
In 2024, U.S. airlines alone paid around $48.2 billion for fuel, that's more than $132 million daily! Fuel prices can swing 30% to 60% year-over-year3, influenced by factors like geopolitical events, refinery disruptions, and market speculation.
Fuel efficiency is a critical lever for improving airline margins. However, without proper tools and strategies to optimize fuel consumption, airlines continue to waste fuel unnecessarily. Small inefficiencies add up quickly across thousands of daily flights, and these unnoticed losses quietly erode profitability over time.
1 Source: IATA, 'Unveiling the biggest airline costs', 2024. - 2 Source: IATA. Chart of the week 'Policy support is vital to make net zero transition a success', 2024. - 3Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration, U.S. Gulf Coast Kerosene- Type Jet Fuel Spot Price FOB graph, 2025
"SAF is currently 3.5 times more expensive than jet fuel", says John Pepper, Allegiant Travel.
Sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) is a key player in decarbonizing aviation in the long term. Yet, it isn’t the solution to controlling fuel costs today.
SAF is still significantly more expensive than traditional jet fuel. During CAPA Conference Americas, John Pepper, Vice President of Corporate Development & Government Affairs at Allegiant Travel Company pointed out SAF is currently 3.5 times more expensive than jet fuel. This cost gap isn’t expected to close anytime soon.
This creates significant financial implications for airlines. Fuel efficiency is the only way to reduce your fuel bill right now. It’s also a way to limit your future SAF-related expenses. Every kilogram of fuel saved today helps you avoid paying that premium in the future.
By investing in fuel efficiency today, you’re improving margins now and preparing your system to reduce fuel /SAF usage and purchases when they become a larger part of your operations.
Even a small percentage of excess jet fuel consumption can quickly lead to significant financial losses (yes, we are talking about millions of dollars).
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📊Let's use a conservative example to explain this statement:
Let's assume there is 1% avoidable overconsumption (50 kg wasted per flight). That means, total wasted fuel per day is 15,265 liters or 4,127 US gallons (using 0.8 kg/l density). Knowing the cost per gallon is $2.14 (based on IATA’s average jet fuel price of $90/barrel), it represents : 🚨Daily missed savings: $8,837 Note: 1% of avoidable overconsumption is a validated, conservative figure. SkyBreathe® users typically reduce between 3% and 5%. |
These numbers clearly show that even small inefficiencies add up quickly. Now, imagine if you could address just a fraction of that waste. Fuel efficiency strategies don’t just minimize waste; they unlock substantial and recurring savings that grow over time, without needing new aircraft or schedule changes.
In the next section, we’ll explore how fuel efficiency can deliver significant, real savings and drive measurable improvements in operational performance. It’s an opportunity to turn data into value right now.
Fuel efficiency in today’s airline environment doesn’t mean retrofitting aircraft or investing in new hardware.
Instead, it’s about making better use of what you already have: your data, processes, and people.
Modern fuel efficiency programs focus on operational optimization, rather than aircraft modification. They work entirely with your existing fleet, using real flight data to identify where and how to reduce unnecessary fuel burn across all phases of flight:
Taxi-out
Climb
Cruise
Descent
Taxi-in
Leading solutions rely on automated data collection from flight data recorders (FDR/QAR) and AI-powered analysis to detect fuel-saving opportunities. It also relies on other external data such as weather, ATC inputs, procedural data (SID, STAR..), to enrich the data and give more context. Examples include:
Overuse of Aircraft Power Unit (APU)
Non-optimal speeds
Inefficient descent profiles
Missed opportunities for single-engine taxi
This approach is non-intrusive and quick to implement. It empowers pilots, dispatchers, and operations teams with clear, actionable recommendations based on actual flight performance.
Fuel efficiency is more than just cost-cutting; it enables smarter decision-making throughout your operation.
But the real question is: how much can fuel efficiency save for you? Let’s break it down into tangible, financial results. Here’s what our data shows can be achieved:
| Small airlines | Medium airline |
Major airline |
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| Fleet type |
40 Medium Haul AC |
150 Medium Haul AC |
600 Medium Haul AC |
| Annual savings | ~ $5 M / year | ~ $20 M / year | ~ $80 M / year |
| Annual CO2 savings | - 20 Ktons / year | - 75 Ktons / year | - 300 Ktons / year |
Fuel efficiency helps you achieve big and real savings
Let’s revisit the previous example, now applying a conservative 3% fuel savings scenario, a result achieved by most SkyBreathe® users:
50 Boeing 737-800s flying 250 flights per day.
Saving 150 kg of fuel per flight.
Total daily fuel saved: 37,500 kg.
That’s 46,875 liters or 12,389 gallons saved daily.
✅ At $2.14 per gallon*, daily savings equal $26,524✅ Annual savings: over $9.6 million
*average 2025 fuel price based on $90/barrel from IATA Fuel Monitor
At 5% savings, these numbers climb to more than $16 million per year, with no aircraft modifications or schedule changes.
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💡Curious about how these savings scale with your airline’s size? |
Fuel efficiency programs typically deliver ROI within months. Indeed, most airlines start seeing measurable fuel savings within four months.
Why? Because rolling out fuel efficiency programs is straightforward.
Once flight data is analyzed, airlines can easily identify fuel-saving opportunities and turn data into real actions. As departments adopt these practices, benefits multiply. When pilots, fuel managers, and operations teams align, fuel savings become part of daily operations, delivering ongoing financial performance.
Cebu Pacific’s case shows this well:
"We have now achieved savings that reach 48% of the potential savings. It represents more than $35 million in savings in 3 years", says Francesc Torres, Director of Flight Operations Technical Support.
After reading Cebu Pacific’s success story, you can easily see the potential for savings in your own airline.
👉 Download Cebu Pacific's Case Study
Philippine Airlines provides a strong example of how fuel-saving initiatives can succeed across complex, long-haul operations.
After implementing a fuel efficiency program with SkyBreathe® and MyFuelCoach™, the airline achieved the following in just 9 months:
3.7 million kg of fuel saved
$4.1 million in cost savings
11,629 tons of CO₂ emissions avoided
These outcomes were powered by data-driven insights and active pilot engagement. Fuel-saving initiatives spanned all flight phases and included targeted pilot awareness programs.
Notably, the average pilot's extra fuel on their Airbus A350 fleet dropped from 143 kg to 61 kg in 7 months, showing rapid behavioral change with the right support.
As noted in their 2022 financial statement:
Philippine Airlines provides a strong example of how fuel-saving initiatives can succeed across complex, long-haul operations.
Ready to unlock fuel efficiency's full potential?
Fuel efficiency is a journey, and the sooner you begin, the faster you’ll see results.
The first step is easy: assess your current practices and identify quick wins.
🔎 Want to know exactly how much you could save?
for your airline based on your fleet, routes, and operations. Get a comprehensive savings report and see how fuel efficiency can boost your bottom line today.
Fuel efficiency is a unique opportunity to boost your airline’s profitability. It starts with small improvements and generates significant savings, up to millions of dollars. This is done without disrupting operations or requiring aircraft changes.
You can capture value quickly by acting today. With the right tools, fuel efficiency also helps you strengthen your competitive position.
Whether you lead a major carrier or a regional airline, achieving meaningful fuel reductions is both practical and realistic.
Interview conducted by Elyssa Gabteni.
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