First Look: Frontier Airlines’ New Lighter Weight Seats

Low-cost carrier Frontier Airlines this week unveiled its first cabin with lighter-weight seats, a change that the airline said would result in “significant fuel savings and added comfort.”

The seats debuted on Frontier’s new Airbus A320neo, a family of aircraft that was first unveiled by Airbus in December 2010. Frontier took delivery of the aircraft and launched its first commercial flight from Orlando International Airport to Newark Liberty International on Tuesday morning. The aircraft is the first of 156 currently on order with Airbus from Frontier.

According to Frontier, the seats, which are 30% lighter than the previous seats on the A320 aircraft, allow the carrier to save 31,683 gallons of fuel per year.

That, based on U.S. Environmental Protection Agency equivalency calculators, means that when Frontier is eventually flying 156 of the aircraft over the course of a year, it will be able to eliminate the equivalent of approximately 642 million plastic bottles, or more than 1.1 billion plastic bags, or more than 15 billion plastic straws from the environment.

“This new aircraft, which is the 105^th in our fleet, represents a significant milestone in Frontier’s commitment to being America’s Greenest Airline,” said Barry Biffle, CEO of Frontier Airlines.

“We are in continuous pursuit of leading-edge strategies to reduce our environmental footprint and, at the same time, reduce fuel costs, which enables us to pass savings on to consumers in the form of lower fares.” Biffle also noted that the new seats feature extra comfort, along with redesigned armrests and a larger tray table that provides added space for laptops, reading materials, and other personal devices.

Continuing the tradition for Frontier, the aircraft will also feature a new animal on the plane’s tail—Francie, a piping plover, named for Dr. Francie Cuthbert of the University of Minnesota who leads the Great Lakes Piping Plover Research Team.

The Piping Plover was close to extinction in the mid-1980s when the species was placed on the endangered list and the work of Dr. Cuthbert and others is helping to restore the species’ population, Frontier said.