Earthjustice & Sierra Club Urge FAA to Keep Ban on Commercial Supersonic Flight

Earthjustice and Sierra Club filed comments urging the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to keep its ban on commercial supersonic flight over land, arguing that lifting the ban would harm public health and the environment. The groups cited that supersonic aircraft burn seven to nine times more fuel than regular planes and emit pollutants linked to respiratory illness, heart disease, and cognitive impairments in children.

Earthjustice & Sierra Club Urge FAA to Keep Ban on Commercial Supersonic Flight Support CleanTechnica's work through a Substack subscription https://cleantechnica.substack.com/subscribe , on Patreon https://www.patreon.com/cleantechnica , or on Stripe https://cleantechnica.fundjournalism.org/contribute/ . Help us produce all of the high-quality, original content we publish week after week https://cleantechnica.com/2026/07/14/10/ despite the challenges of content-scraping AI, antisocial media, inflation, and other hurdles. The long-held rule is a commonsense protection against sonic booms and unnecessary climate emissions. Washington, D.C. — Today, Earthjustice and Sierra Club filed comments https://earthjustice.org/document/comments-to-faa-to-keep-ban-on-commercial-supersonic-flight urging the Federal Aviation Administration FAA not to repeal its long-held ban on commercial supersonic flight over land https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/07/02/2026-13440/enabling-supersonic-overland-flight . “The FAA’s proposal to allow supersonic flights over our communities reverses decades of evidence-based safeguards and flies in the face of the agency’s statutory mandate to protect the public from aircraft noise and sonic booms,” said Amanda Lineberry, Senior Attorney at Earthjustice. “Enabling supersonic flight will result in dangerous emissions that exacerbate the climate crisis and endanger our public health and the environment, all to serve only the wealthiest of customers.” “For 50 years, the ban on supersonic flights has protected communities from deafening sonic booms, dangerous air pollution, and unnecessary harm to wildlife,” said Sierra Club Senior Attorney Andrea Issod. “The Trump administration is now trying to throw these protections away, not because the science has changed but to satisfy corporate interests chasing faster luxury travel. Americans shouldn’t have to sacrifice our air quality, public health, or peace and quiet so a select few can fly faster than the speed of sound. The FAA must reject this reckless ‘boom-doggle’ and keep the ban on supersonic flight in place.” Background Supersonic flight is disproportionately harmful to public health and the environment. In addition to carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and water vapor, supersonic aircraft emit https://doi.org/10.1039/d1ea00081k sulfur oxides, black carbon, carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, and particulate matter. When breathed in, these pollutants harm public health by increasing instances of respiratory illness, heart disease, and cognitive impairments in children. Greenhouse gas emissions from aircraft account for 4% of all U.S. climate emissions https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/IF11696 , and supersonic planes burn seven to nine times https://theicct.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/aviation-global-supersonic-safs-mar22.pdf more fuel than regular planes. Along with climate-warming and unhealthy emissions, supersonic aircrafts cause “sonic booms” and other types of noise including evanescent waves. These booms produce shock waves that travel for tens of miles on either side https://theicct.org/sites/default/files/publications/Supersonic Impact Working Paper 20190130.pdf of the flight path of a supersonic jet, disturbing humans and wildlife alike. Sign up for CleanTechnica's Weekly Substack for Zach and Scott's in-depth analyses and high level summaries https://cleantechnica.substack.com/subscribe , sign up for our daily newsletter https://mailchi.mp/cleantechnica/daily-newsletter , and follow us on Google News https://news.google.com/publications/CAAqLQgKIidDQklTRndnTWFoTUtFV05zWldGdWRHVmphRzVwWTJFdVkyOXRLQUFQAQ Have a tip for CleanTechnica? Want to advertise? Want to suggest a guest for our CleanTech Talk podcast? Contact us here https://cleantechnica.com/contact/ . Sign up for our daily newsletter for 15 new cleantech stories a day https://mailchi.mp/cleantechnica/daily-newsletter . Or sign up for our weekly one on top stories of the week https://mailchi.mp/cleantechnica/weekly-newsletter if daily is too frequent. CleanTechnica uses affiliate links. See our policy here https://cleantechnica.com/cleantechnica-editorial-ethics/ . CleanTechnica's Comment Policy https://cleantechnica.com/cleantechnica-comment-policy/