CHICAGO — A World War II-era air-traffic network that often forces planes to take longer, zigzagging routes is costing U.S. airlines billions of dollars in wasted fuel while an upgrade to a satellite-based system has languished in the planning stages for more than a decade.
The $35 billion plan would replace the current radar system with a GPS technology that has become commonplace in cars and cellphones. Supporters say it would triple air-traffic capacity, reduce delays by at least half, improve safety and curb greenhouse-gas emissions.
An Associated Press analysis of federal and industry data found that if the system were already in place, airlines could have saved more than $5 billion in fuel this year alone.
But funding delays and the complexities of the switch-over have kept the project grounded. The government does not expect to have it running until the early 2020s, and without a major commitment, supporters warn that even that goal might be not be attainable.
“The United States has been to the moon and back. I think the public deserves that same level of effort for our national airspace system,” said Robert Sturgell, the acting administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration.
The planned satellite-driven network, dubbed NextGen, would save fuel by enabling GPS-equipped planes to fly the shortest route between two points: a straight line.
NextGen could save airlines at least 3.3 billion gallons of fuel a year — or more than $10 billion annually by 2025, based on today’s fuel prices, according to FAA projections.
Currently, jetliners move in single-file lines along narrow highways in the sky marked by radio beacons. Many of the routes gently zigzag from one beacon to the next, sometimes forcing cross-country flights to follow sweeping arcs and waste hundreds of gallons of fuel.
It’s “the equivalent of using an electric typewriter when others are using computers,” said David Castelveter, a spokesman for the Air Transportation Association.
A report on NextGen released last month by the Government Accountability Office said major problems remained, including a lack of detail about just how the system would work and a shortage of the kind of highly skilled managers needed to see the project through.
Critics have said the Bush administration, while expressing support for a satellite-based system, never pushed hard enough for it.
“The next president needs to make the NextGen initiative a national priority and ensure that it is given the resources, management attention and sense of urgency that it warrants,” said Rep. Bart Gordon, D-Tenn.
