Human Behaviour: The Overlooked Factor in Improving Operational Efficiency

Achieving meaningful change almost always starts with small steps, whether that’s doing something small each day to improve your well-being or reducing household energy consumption by switching off appliances.

The idea that little changes stack up has been a powerful driver for individuals to make more sustainable decisions in their personal lives, and many businesses have also implemented methods to encourage individuals, whether they are consumers, employees or the general public, to shift their behaviour towards specific outcomes.

Businesses like Opower and Monzo have used behavioural science to shift customers’ decision-making patterns regarding energy usage and gambling, respectively.

But it’s much rarer for businesses to apply the same approach to improve their operations; programmes to improve efficiency and sustainability are more likely to invest in technology and new tools or operational processes rather than looking at how small changes in human behaviour can add up to significant efficiency gains and emissions reductions.

Small shifts in behaviour across a workforce can quickly reduce an organisation’s environmental impact, particularly in industries like maritime and aviation, where crew members make daily decisions which directly affect fuel consumption.

Shipping companies and airlines typically know what they want their crews to do to save more fuel, but struggle to generate the needed behaviour change. Signol works with businesses to identify behaviour change opportunities for emissions reductions and engages employees with behavioural change techniques so that they consistently act more sustainably in their daily workflows.

We’re passionate about ensuring that human behaviour isn’t overlooked in industries’ journeys to net zero, particularly for hard-to-abate sectors.

In aviation, we have helped airlines increase fuel-saving behaviours like optimising the discretionary fuel loaded onboard and performing reduced/single-engine taxiing manoeuvres wherever possible. Virgin Atlantic Airlines, for example, saw an 8% increase in these behaviours and, as a result, avoided 12,500 tonnes of CO2 emissions in 18 months.

Similarly, clients like Christiania Shipping have achieved significant fuel savings in maritime through Signol’s behaviour change service. In just six months, Christiania saw particular success with crew members optimising vessels’ trim more frequently, and saved more than 250 metric tonnes of fuel in six months, avoiding at least 790 metric tonnes of CO2.

To demonstrate the scale of the opportunity for behaviour-led impact, we’ve collected other real-life examples where airlines and shipping companies have made significant progress by shifting crew behaviour.

‘Crew adjustments’ puts tanker operator Torm two years ahead of CO2 reduction target

With the aim of achieving immediate emissions reductions, Danish tanker operator Torm has implemented vessel monitoring from onshore experts, who then suggest how crew members onboard can adjust their use of energy-consuming machinery.

Crew behaviour, such as not using air conditioning at full power unnecessarily, reduced greenhouse gas emissions by 39.6% and has put Torm two years ahead of its own target for reducing carbon intensity. Torm has explained that crew training and communication have been key elements in leading to more effective day-to-day use of equipment.

P&O Ferries achieve 3-7% fuel burn reduction through crew efficiency programme

P&O Ferries has had particular success in reducing fuel burn and emissions through its initiative, which connects analysts with vessel crews to find efficiency opportunities. This has included granular tracking of main engine usage, quantified every 30 seconds, enabling the crew to react quickly to detected inefficiencies, including changing driving styles and engine configurations.

As a result, the company has saved more than 135,000 tonnes of emissions in two years, produced a 3.6% fuel saving per leg on its Hull-Rotterdam route, and reduced emissions by 7% annually on the Larne-Cairnryan route.

Japanese airline ANA reduces emissions through ‘cumulative efforts’ of crew

Japanese airline ANA implemented an initiative to encourage pilots to perform three procedures to save fuel: One Engine Taxi In (also known as Single Engine Taxi In), Normal Climb, and Reverse Idle.

Increasing the implementation of these procedures within the appropriate environmental and weather conditions reduced CO₂ emissions by more than 15,000 tonnes in 2021.

The airline explains: “The implementation rate of these three measures largely reflects the awareness, ingenuity, and cumulative efforts of the crew members. Therefore, we hope to raise the awareness of each individual, which in turn will raise the awareness of the entire flight operations department, leading to an increase in the implementation rate and thus to a reduction in CO₂ emissions.”

US Air Force saves 1.75 million pounds of fuel through behaviour change

A pilot programme at two US Air Force bases identified six areas where behaviour change among pilots could produce efficiency gains, including reducing the number of engines running during taxiing and employing Continuous Descent operations.

Over a five-month campaign, the ‘Mission Execution Excellence Program’ (MEEP), the two bases saved more than 1.75 million pounds of fuel. The Air Force projected that this approach could save up to $80 million per year and increase its mission effectiveness per gallon of fuel by up to 3%.

In a different initiative focused on fuel planning, The US Air Force’s 171st Air Refueling Wing reduced the carriage of unnecessary fuel by 35% since 2006, saving around $800,000 and reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 9.2%. This has meant that the Air Force has been able to reduce fuel consumption even while increasing flying hours.

Maximising the positive impact of every employee’s decisions

The examples above demonstrate how behaviour-focused initiatives can produce real change – by promoting more sustainable behaviour among an operational workforce like airline and shipping crews. While one-off initiatives like these can successfully achieve specific goals, continuous results and sustained behaviour change need a longer-term approach. Signol provides this without requiring a company to repeatedly put effort into behaviour change campaigns. So far, we have consistently saved fuel and CO2 emissions for multiple aviation and shipping companies.

In the maritime and aviation industries, where we currently specialise, there is an untapped opportunity to reduce fuel consumption and emissions within months by focusing on the human factor, making savings of 1-2% in aviation and 4-12% in maritime.

A report by McKinsey showed that between 2005 and 2019, most fuel efficiency gains at airlines were through fleet upgrades and increasing the density of passengers on flights, with 7% of efficiency gains due to increasing specific fuel-saving behaviour like reduced engine taxi, continuous descent operations, and optimised routes in flight planning. While the opportunities from fleet upgrades and increasing passenger density are approaching their limits, the potential for behaviour-led improvements can be harnessed for years to come, and will remain important over the transition to alternative fuels.

Our ambition goes beyond both maritime and aviation. At Signol, we believe there’s an immediate opportunity for businesses across all industries to achieve greater efficiency and sustainability by maximising the positive impact of employees’ daily decisions. We see great potential and opportunity in sectors like corporate travel, where employees can be supported to make more sustainable travel decisions, and rail, where engaging drivers and operational employees to save fuel could show similar results to those we have already achieved in aviation and maritime.

Achieving this impact requires a rigorous approach to engaging employees and identifying opportunities for change. In the following articles, we’ll share more insights on how we use behavioural science together to help clients reduce emissions.

Find out how one of the world’s most fuel-efficient airlines, Virgin Atlantic, empowered pilots to increase the implementation of two of these fuel-saving actions in our case study.