this post was submitted on 19 Feb 2026
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Contrails are mostly water vapour that's condensed due to the hot exhaust of airplane engines.
They are certainly not completely avoidable, they are likely inescapable without sacrificing significant fuel efficiencies (eg: all methods stealth fighters use to suppress or mask their exhaust heat signature).. which would negate any benefits to global warming.
P. s. I'm not going to watch a YouTube video that could be a few paragraphs of textual explanation, because it'll no doubt be eight times longer than it needs to be for the benefit of more ad money or promotion in the almighty algorithm.
That YouTube Short seems to be a valid one. It's by someone who (according to his own words) has a PhD in atmospheric physics. Basically, he says that contrails causes global warming by preventing heat from escaping from Earth, and that contrails are mostly only formed when a plane flies through a cold humid patch. By simply re-routing planes around these cold patches, the contrails could be reduced.
Wouldn't rerouting be more fuel-intensive in most scenarios, though? I feel like burning more fuel to make fewer clouds isn't the right play.
It would require a slight increase in fuel consumption, traded off with a large decrease in heating caused by the water vapour.
Seriously, you should watch the video, it covers all of this stuff.