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Transportation Privacy

Should Airlines Weigh Passengers To Help Cut Carbon Emissions? (cnn.com) 343

"The equation is simple: The heavier the plane, the more environmentally unfriendly the trip is," notes one report -- yet airplanes are still relying on estimates for their total weight.

"A British tech start-up thinks it has a solution: weighing customers to more accurately calculate fuel costs..." "The capture of passenger weights is not complicated," says Roy Fuscone, Chairman & CEO of Fuel Matrix Limited. "A simple weighing device added to the current equipment will capture the weight and the software will register and transmit it in relation to a flight but not necessarily identified to a particular passenger...." The company's website states that benefits from this system include statistically robust information feedback based on airlines' data, significant reduction of CO2 emissions, significant fuel savings, and reduced mechanical stress on aircraft. If you're worried about this data being made public, Fuscone says that the company plans to enable the passenger to retain direct control of their own data so that they can delete it once it has been "employed in the interests of fuel efficiency."
It seems like it'd be easier to just weigh the plane after everyone's onboard -- or find some way to calculate weights using the boarding ramp. But the current plans aren't that simple, CNN reports: One proposal is for passengers to supply the information ahead of arriving at the airport, in the same way that they supply passport details. Otherwise, it could be made part of the security process before boarding. "You stand in a scanner that goes round you -- now, clearly while you're standing there being scanned, you could also be being weighed -- very discreetly -- if you haven't wanted to supply your information ahead of time," says Fuel Matrix CEO Roy Fuscone. "It would be very discreet, very private and very confidential."

Fuscone stresses that Fuel Matrix has been working with GDPR consultants to ensure the data would remain classified. He points out that airports already collect a lot of information on passengers. This would be just one more element to the equation. "Airports already use biometric data on passengers because they associate an image of your face with your boarding card, so that means that when you buy a ticket it's already in the contract that they can do that," says Fuscone. "So there's no problem with us introducing this, it can be done at various places during the journey through the airport and so we're starting to discuss with people involved in those various phases of the airport. If this is all done properly [...] it will alleviate carbon in the atmosphere and climate change and air pollution."

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Should Airlines Weigh Passengers To Help Cut Carbon Emissions?

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  • No (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 27, 2019 @08:39PM (#58503064)

    You should measure them so their fat arms dont melt over the armrests into my personal space.

  • Should... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by YrWrstNtmr ( 564987 ) on Saturday April 27, 2019 @08:45PM (#58503080)
    Obviously, no.
    You'll find your customer base gets even more pissed off than it already is.

    And how does this reduce carbon emissions? The person is on the aircraft anyway, fat or not. You're planning on changing the fuel load based on aggregate passenger weight?
    So then if you have a flight of skinnies, you'll take extra time and defuel some gas? Thereby the aircraft is on the ground longer, messing with schedules.

    The 'average weight' works. They even have differing 'averages' for winter vs summer.

    Lastly, if the weight data is captured, it will be tied to a person. And that data will leak out sooner or later.


    Go on....bring on the 'fat american' jokes. You know you want to.
    • Re: Should... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Most Americans are quite thin, it is only the US citizens that are fat.

    • It reuses the amount of "extra fuel" a plane has to carry because "we only guestimated the weight" ... a no brainer.

    • by Kohath ( 38547 ) on Saturday April 27, 2019 @09:53PM (#58503390)

      Obviously, no.

      How will people know they're guilty of sinning against the planet without that sort of ritual public shaming?

    • I donâ(TM)t remember when exactly they started, but every airline Iâ(TM)ve flown on in the last several years weighs checked baggage so they can charge extra if itâ(TM)s over their policy maximum. Some even weigh your carryon too. So passenger weigh-ins and surcharges would be the next logical step.

      And if the airline industry gave a rip about not making passengers miserable and pissed off, thereâ(TM)s a VERY long list of things they wouldnâ(TM)t have already done.

    • Re:Should... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Blymie ( 231220 ) on Sunday April 28, 2019 @01:15AM (#58503890)

      Really, I don't get this.

      They still have to carry loads of extra fuel, in case of:

      - inclement weather, we don't have climate control satellites yet, and we can't perfectly predict weather yet
      - delays in landing, such as problems at landing airport (plane crash, iced up runways, technical issues, other generic reasons)

      Imagine something happens to traffic control, and the plane has to circle for an hour or two anyhow?

      They'll never be precise on this, and if they have a heavier load it's what? 5% less fuel or something?

      Pointless and silly, with all the above (and more) to take into account.

    • You know you want to.

      It's actually kind of embarrassing that half of my countrymen look like the cast from WALL-E...

    • Re: (Score:2, Troll)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      It would be illegal in the UK and many other places anyway.

      Women are on average smaller and lighter than men. Some ethnic groups are on average smaller and lighter than others. Some people have medical conditions that result in weight gain, not to mention people who need equipment like wheelchairs or prosthetic limbs that have a different weight to biological ones.

      Practically it would also create a rush for the bathroom right before weighing, as people try to drop a few kilos. And unless they are going to w

      • Why would it be "banned" under GDPR? You already consent to pricacy-invading procedures in air travel, and that informed consent should be sufficient. Why would immediate weight be a problem and your biometric data, flight history, etc. isn't?
        • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

          GDPR requires opt-in consent for every different use of your data that is not vital for providing the service. I find it extremely unlikely that any court would think weighing you was vital, considering that it hasn't been for the better part of a century of air travel.

          The airline can only handle things like biometric data if it is needed for immigration purposes, otherwise they have to get your permission. Flight history can only be kept as long as needed for immigration, taxation and other legally require

    • You'll find your customer base gets even more pissed off than it already is.

      Huh? Who is pissed off? I mean people will shout from the roof how pissed off customers are, and yet airline passenger numbers just don't seem to stop growing. In the past 10 years alone we've gone from 2.5bn people to 4.5bn people flying annually.

      And how does this reduce carbon emissions? The person is on the aircraft anyway, fat or not. You're planning on changing the fuel load based on aggregate passenger weight? You're planning on changing the fuel load based on aggregate passenger weight?
      So then if you have a flight of skinnies, you'll take extra time and defuel some gas?

      They are proposing to weight passengers to allow them to more accurately calculate the fuel load to ensure that energy isn't spent carrying *extra* fuel around that you wouldn't need.

      To be clear this is stupid but not for the reason you posted. This is stupid beca

    • Obviously, no. The 'average weight' works. They even have differing 'averages' for winter vs summer.

      Lastly, if the weight data is captured, it will be tied to a person. And that data will leak out sooner or later.

      The only time there is a problem is on the short flights. I always travelled "heavy" I had several trunks packed with equipment. On one flight there was a really heavy person who they moved to keep the commuter balanced.

      Unlike the assholes in here, I was mortified because it was because of me and my equipment.

  • Can't they just check the weight on the drivers licenses as an estimate?

    • Can't they just check the weight on the drivers licenses as an estimate?

      I'm not in favor of the weighing, but I'm 39 and I don't remember having been asked weight information when renewing my driver's licence so I checked...yep, it has the weight I was at when I was 15 years old.

      So, no.

  • by iggymanz ( 596061 ) on Saturday April 27, 2019 @08:56PM (#58503128)

    The operating empty weight of 787-8 (shortest lightest one) plane is 264,500 lbs. Then 227120 lbs. of fuel get added. Loaded with what FAA assumes are males (184 lbs) that's going to be 44,500 pounds of swinging dick owners.

    The weight of some fatso human's doesn't matter. It's a joke

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Solandri ( 704621 )
      The weight does make some difference. Especially with the smaller commuter planes. A couple of them have gone down because the weight of the passengers and their luggage resulted in the plane being overloaded [wikipedia.org].

      Statistically, the more times you roll the dice, the tighter the distribution gets [wikipedia.org] and the the more likely your actual result is to be closer to the mean. So the bigger planes with hundreds of passengers statistically have a high probability of their actual weight being close to the FAA estimated
      • by rtb61 ( 674572 )

        Talk about rolling the dice, what could possibly go wrong with a jet plane full of passenger with an absolute minimum fuel load, I'll bet the passengers weigh a whole lot less when the plane runs out of fuel and crashes into the ground. Better they guess high and have spare, the measure low and run out.

  • The answer is yes (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Flight costs are simple.... how much fuel it costs to move N pounds of cargo from point A to point B. Airlines are already charging you for extra bags. It isn't because of a lack of space in the belly of the airplane it is because they are "cargo" and add weight to the plane. Yes everybody thinks its a scam and maybe it is but I have been in the ticket line behind a couple that had 8 huge bags to check in. That's cargo.

    As to the other comments.... Airlines already "measure" your carry-on luggage so they

    • Not a chance (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Excelcia ( 906188 ) <slashdot@excelcia.ca> on Saturday April 27, 2019 @10:31PM (#58503508) Homepage Journal

      Simply put it costs the airline a *lot* less to fly a...

      Negative.

      First of all, the median weight of all the passengers on a 787 will almost never vary by more than one or (at the most) two thousand pounds. A few thousand pounds of human on half a million pounds of aircraft and fuel (not counting cargo, which is on every passenger flight too, and luggage) has less effect on the overall fuel consumption than the butterfly that just flapped its wings on the other side of the world. It's statistical noise.

    • Re:The answer is yes (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Cinnamon Beige ( 1952554 ) on Saturday April 27, 2019 @10:54PM (#58503580)

      Here's the problem: It would be simpler to, at most, weigh the person and their luggage together. No muss, no fuss, NO PRIVATE DATA FOR SOME MORON AT THE AIRLINE TO LEAK , and you get the aggregate cost of the person flying.

      Which, as has been pointed out, isn't likely to vary by much.

      If the important part to you is passenger comfort, it'd be more efficient go with volume. 250 pounds of muscle takes up vastly less space than 250 pounds of fat, after all. You can even make it quick and easy to check: You step into a booth at check-in, if the door can be closed without packing you in you're good. (A potential bonus is that it might also get regulatory minimum space allotments for passengers, while currently the airlines seem to be working on finding out just how tiny they can make that tiny box of personal space before there's rioting and lawsuits.)

  • Before our airport was upgraded we were serviced by 20 something seat prop planes. There was no security checks back then but you and your luggage was weighed. It was two man job one read the scales then yelled the weight to some scribe. Except when it was a fat woman then he wispered it.
  • by dcollins ( 135727 ) on Saturday April 27, 2019 @09:03PM (#58503162) Homepage

    "You stand in a scanner that goes round you..."

    Not if you "opt out" from the shortwave scanner. Which, e.g., I do all the time.

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Their claims are full of contradictions. Data won't be associated with passengers, but passengers will be able to control and delete it.

      No, you will get my express permission to collect it, which cannot be required for me to fly. If I give you permission (I won't) you will delete it automatically as soon as it has been used for the purpose I gave permission for. GDPR is clear on this.

    • That's fine, you'll simply stand on scales while your get personally probed. Just remember to not moan the wrong TSA agent's name. You'll end up with a very pissed agent saying "Who's Carl. I thought I was the one!"

  • hypocrites (Score:3, Insightful)

    by kqc7011 ( 525426 ) on Saturday April 27, 2019 @09:09PM (#58503184)
    1,500 private jets arrive in Davos for climate change meeting.
    • And I drive to work every day to design a carbon reduction system for our upcoming H2 plant. The effect of me getting to the destination to do my work has a far larger effect on the climate than my exhaust emissions.

  • Weigh the laden aircraft, sure.
    The aggregate weight of the laden air craft IS what is needed for the flight cost estimates.
    Weight the individual people? Fuck off!
    The weight of the individuals is only desirable as a salable datum. So no.
    It's just that simple.

  • Go right ahead, airline industry, you want lawsuits? Because that's how you get lawsuits!
    Your Honor, they discriminated against me because I have a genetic condition/medical conditionm it's not my fault I'm heavy!
    • A look at the insurance industry (e.g. higher premiums for young drivers) suggests that any lawsuits wouldn't hold up, because the airline can easily establish that higher weight = higher fuel costs. Any high school physics teacher could testify to that.

      Part of me would love weight-based airline ticket pricing to become a thing in the US just to witness the beautiful irony of staunchly pro-capitalistic family members complaining about it.
  • Re: (Score:4, Informative)

    by Koby77 ( 992785 ) on Saturday April 27, 2019 @09:34PM (#58503292)

    And how does this reduce carbon emissions? The person is on the aircraft anyway, fat or not. You're planning on changing the fuel load based on aggregate passenger weight?

    I believe the gist of it, which is poorly described, is that you need to fill the plane with enough fuel to carry the load from the departure to the destination. You could potentially carry just barely enough fuel to make it to the destination, thereby reducing the cost compared to completely topping off the plane, because carrying that extra fuel requires energy as well.

    It may also be difficult to weigh the plane once everyone is onboard, because you need to fuel up the plane well in advance of getting to the runway.

    From reading the article, I don't think that the company in question intends to use the information for any sort of nefarious means. But once that data is collected, we all know how that story ends.

    • I believe the gist of it, which is poorly described, is that you need to fill the plane with enough fuel to carry the load from the departure to the destination. You could potentially carry just barely enough fuel to make it to the destination

      If true, that is one of the more idiotic ideas I’ve heard in a long time. If it actually made it to implementation, it would only be policy until the first plane went down while in a holding pattern.

      On the plus side, the crash victims’ families would become rather wealthy.

      • Re: (Score:4, Interesting)

        by dgatwood ( 11270 ) on Saturday April 27, 2019 @10:41PM (#58503532) Homepage Journal

        This. You have to carry some extra fuel to handle unexpected delays and diversions. Only about 26% of a full aircraft (using a 737-800 as an example) is passenger weight plus baggage weight combined. So when full, most of the fuel is spent moving around the aircraft and its fuel, not passengers.

        So even if passengers weighed a third less than the expected weight, and even if that made up two-third of the total pax + luggage weight, that means you'd only reduce the fuel requirements by maybe six percent.

        Here's where it gets fun. Only only 23% of the weight comes from fuel. And because the tank is empty by the end of the flight, averaged over the duration of the flight, the fuel tank is half full. So if the passengers weighed a third less than the expected amount, the fuel used to move the extra fuel would be half of 23% of 6%, or only a paltry 0.69% reduction in total fuel use over the duration of the flight.

        To put that in perspective, the longest 737-800 flight is only 7 hours, 25 minutes, which means that even in the best-case scenario, the fuel reduction would only extend the maximum flight time by about three minutes and 4 seconds.

        And, of course, this assumes that the aircraft starts out full of fuel so that it can fly for so many hours. For a three-hour tour, the weight of the aircraft becomes an even bigger percentage of the total, and the savings are even smaller.

        So much for your big savings. Yes, in aggregate, I'm sure there are pencil-pushers at the airlines who think, "We could do this and save a hundred bucks per average-length flight." Remember that these are the same people who are considering charging to use the toilet, and keep that in mind when you choose which airline to fly in the future.

        There is absolutely no plausible scientific basis for measuring passenger weight in an effort to save fuel. The savings are complete and utter noise. Therefore, either the people proposing this haven't thought about it seriously or this is really just an excuse for fat shaming or charging heavier passengers more money. Either way, this makes no sense whatsoever. Stuffing one passenger per flight into the baggage hold on a discounted fare would make a far bigger difference in revenue, and would probably result in happier passengers, too.

        • If you think 0.69% is paltry, then you obviously haven't worked in mass production. A small percentage of a very large number is sometimes a very large number, and they do move a billion passengers per year.

          • by dgatwood ( 11270 )

            If you think 0.69% is paltry, then you obviously haven't worked in mass production.

            Mass production is a different world, because customers are not immediately and obviously affected by small changes in cost. Yes, if a product fails after three years instead of five, they're affected, but by then, it is too late for the negative reviews to have any affect on your profits, so companies often don't care. By contrast, forcing your customers to stand on a scale affects customer happiness immediately. You can'

        • spend some money on some better models and more sensors for wind prediction...

          that might make a real difference... but that would be hard and not very sexy

          John

      • I believe the gist of it, which is poorly described, is that you need to fill the plane with enough fuel to carry the load from the departure to the destination. You could potentially carry just barely enough fuel to make it to the destination

        If true, that is one of the more idiotic ideas I’ve heard in a long time. If it actually made it to implementation, it would only be policy until the first plane went down while in a holding pattern.

        On the plus side, the crash victims’ families would become rather wealthy.

        It sounds like the kind of idea come up by people who never have had to seriously think about how far they can get on a tank of gas, too. Environmental conditions influence fuel consumption; it's going to be the first plane that is flying in worse conditions than the math assumes, particularly since holding patterns are supposed to prioritize planes low on fuel. What's going to be the disaster is the plane that crashes because runs out before it even gets to its destination.

        Though the fact that holding pa

  • Utter Bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Required Snark ( 1702878 ) on Saturday April 27, 2019 @09:38PM (#58503312)
    It's not about carbon it's about revenue and discrimination. Seat sizes are already so small they increase the chances of blood clots and cause passengers to be so unhappy they fight. Now they want to monetize size and make the standard seat even smaller. They would charge for breathing if they could get away with it.

    Passenger health is now a commodity. The FAA is useless and there is no way to change that. We are all farm animals to corporate America.

    • Imagine the fun if the FAA mandated that the airlines re-calculate the size of the seats due to the current size average of the people who sit within them.

    • You make it sound like some grave injustice has been committed against you. If the extra legroom is worth that much to you, don't fly the budget carriers, and shell out a few extra bucks to get an exit row or bulkhead seat. No one is forcing you to fly on the cheapest available ticket, or to fly at all.

  • If you're not a religious environmentalist, your plane ride is not a sin no matter how much you weigh.

    Don't you all love being scolded by self righteous moralists every day about everything?

  • First of all, you don't need the weight of the person. You need the weight of the person, their clothes, their shoes, their accessories, what they are carrying on them, and their carry on luggage.

    If the company is so worried about getting the accurate figure then they would want to weigh each passenger with all of their possessions that they will be carrying on board the plane. There's no need to know the weight of the passengers themselves.

    I found an interesting article about how airlines estimate the weig [stackexchange.com]

  • by nehumanuscrede ( 624750 ) on Saturday April 27, 2019 @10:01PM (#58503424)

    Don't pack so many F*****G people on the plane.

    Their quest to cram as many seats into a limited space is now up against the average size of a human being.
    Remove fifty GD seats from the plane and you'll achieve the same weight / efficiency savings you're trying to push off on your passengers.

    I mean, if you're TRULY serious about reducing your carbon footprint and not finding yet another reason to soak more money out of folks.

    • This is the fault of customer who tend to buy the cheapest tickets, no matter what the conditions. A few airlines have tried offering wider seat spacing at higher prices, but customers didn't go for it. The information is on seatguru and other places, but it doesn't seem to affect purchase decisions ./

    • Remove fifty GD seats from the plane and you'll achieve the same weight / efficiency savings you're trying to push off on your passengers.

      I mean, if you're TRULY serious about reducing your carbon footprint and not finding yet another reason to soak more money out of folks.

      Brilliant, except for the part where you'll end up with 15-25% more planes in the air since most flights run nearly full these days and the people who needed to fly from point A to point B still need to do so.

      Which will make the per flyer carbon load go up since it takes a big bunch of energy to move the plane itself, and you just put a lot more of them in the air to move the same number of people. (And by the same token, everyone's tickets will now cost more because the fixed costs of operating the flig

    • Remove fifty GD seats from the plane and you'll achieve the same... efficiency savings

      Far be it for me to come to the defence of the beancounters but they might have cause to take issue with the above statement...

    • Don't pack so many F*****G people on the plane.

      This is the dumbest comment I've read. Unless your goal is actually more expensive tickets so less people can afford to fly in which case carry on.

      and not finding yet another reason to soak more money out of folks.

      Oh no, you were actually serious. You think airlines are "soaking money" out of folks rather than the reality of tough competition driving the cost of flying down to the lowest point it has ever been.

      Wow. Here's a thought: Engage the brain before attempting to have thoughts in the future.

  • by ClarkMills ( 515300 ) on Saturday April 27, 2019 @10:39PM (#58503526)

    ...you would weigh, measure, penalise for noise, smelliness, infection. We don't live in an ideal world...

  • I'd think strain gauges or similar could weigh the plane when its loaded with passengers and cargo to help optimize flight operations if it makes a significant difference.

    • You'd think so. You'd think that a modern commuter plane would be full of strain gauges to measure wing flex and landing gear stress and so on. But for aerospace applications, modern strain gauge technology is a lot worse than most people think.

  • Or is this one of the hallowed exceptions?

  • Sure. "Carbon Emissions". I bet that's what this is really about. Uh huh.

  • If obtaining a reasonably accurate reading of the total weight is the problem, why not measure the strain on the landing gear at the gate?
  • If this business strategy worked, buffets would already be charging people based on their weight. The real question is, are airlines stupid enough to try it when other businesses know better?

  • Obviously. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by eneville ( 745111 ) on Sunday April 28, 2019 @03:02AM (#58504058) Homepage

    Yes.

    You get other things in adult/child sizes at different costs. If one weighs heavier then they should pay the surplus. Sometimes in life the smaller of the human (as in nature) does not thrive so well, due to being pushed to the back. So in theory, why should they pay as much?

  • People who demand fro airline industry and passengers to reduce their carbon footprint are brainless imbecile eco fanatic bullies

  • The A350-900 is the first A350 model, has a maximum takeoff weight (MTOW) of 275 tonnes, typically seats 325 passengers

    Typical low end adult weight is 50kg, typical high end adult weight is 200kg

    Average weight in North America is 80.7 kg .

    We are talking about maximum 120kg additional weight which is 0.03% of the total weight of plane.

    Another way: 325 passengers by 80.7 = 26 tonnes. We are talking about variation of 0.5% of all load weight of the plane.

    This is nothing but media perpetuated hatred of a group

  • As anyone with common sense knows, a passenger plane weighs a lot, especially when full of fuel. The weight difference between even the skinniest and the largest passenger does not amount to even a rounding error when looking at their fraction of the overall weight of the plane itself, let alone the fuel.

    What counts much more than your weight is the proportion of the plane you inhabit. Take a business class flight and approximately triple your share of the overall CO2 emissions in a fully laden flight. F

  • Not a significant technical challenge (build sensors in to the landing gear or sensors on the taxi ways), not intrusive or discriminatory on passengers, and a more accurate reflection of the aircraft's weight and hence carbon footprint.

  • by guacamole ( 24270 ) on Sunday April 28, 2019 @11:37AM (#58505370)

    If you're worried about this data being made public, Fuscone says that the company plans to enable the passenger to retain direct control of their own data so that they can delete it once it has been "employed in the interests of fuel efficiency."

    Just forget about this statement. We can't trust the airlines or airports to keep the data of our weights secure and private in the age when even financial institutions, social networks, and governments are reporting on a regular basis millions of logins and passwords stolen. Surely, the airlines have security standards that are above those institutions? On yeah, they say you will be "in charge" of your private data, just like every OTHER BUSINESS you have dealt with LAST 25 YEARS said. But who has the time to spend one hour every day dialing numbers, clicking, or writing letters to those companies asking please don't share my data?

The unfacts, did we have them, are too imprecisely few to warrant our certitude.

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