Last month, Alaska Airlines took a major green step forward and launched its first flights using sustainable jet fuel! Two trial flights departed from Seattle to San Francisco and Washington DC using the new biofuel. The product comes from a renewable energy and biofuel company based in Englewood, Colorado called Gevo. The airline tested the 20/80 mix of sustainable biodiesel that comes from American-grown corn and traditional jet fuel. The mixed fuel reduced each flight’s emissions by 50%.

If this biofuel mix was used in 20% of the airline’s fuel supply, overall greenhouse gas emissions would be cut by 142,000 metric tons of CO2, the equivalent of 30,000 less passenger vehicles on the road for one year. Alaska Airlines aims to use sustainable biofuel on all flights at one or more of its primary airports by 2020. This is the second biofuel test the airline has completed; 75 flights were tested with cooking oil-based biofuel in 2011.