Source: US DOT
The Department of Transportation’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) today released U.S. airlines’ April 2023 fuel cost and consumption numbers indicating U.S. scheduled service airlines used 1.484 billion gallons of fuel, 3.9% less fuel than in March 2023 (1.545 billion gallons) and 0.1% less than in pre-pandemic April 2019. The cost per gallon of fuel in April 2023 ($2.66) was down 26 cents (8.8%) from March 2023 ($2.91) and up $0.60 (29.3%) from April 2019. Total April 2023 fuel expenditure ($3.94B) was down 12.4% from March 2023 ($4.50B) and up 29.1% from pre-pandemic April 2019.
Year-over-year changes in fuel consumption and cost for April 2023 include 6.8% increase in domestic fuel consumption, 20.6% decrease in domestic fuel cost, and 25.6% decrease in cost per gallon. Domestic fuel consumption decreased 6.4% from March 2023 to April 2023, while increasing 0.5% from April 2019. Increased fuel consumption reflects an increase in airline passenger travel over the same period.
Fuel consumed by U.S. airlines (total) scheduled service:
Fuel cost per gallon for U.S. airlines (total) scheduled service:
Total fuel cost for U.S. airlines (total) scheduled service:
Fuel Cost and Consumption data from March 2000 to the present can be found at https://transtats.bts.gov/fuel.asp. Summaries by month are also available.
Airline fuel costs may be affected by hedging, contracts that allow airlines to limit exposure to future price changes.
Individual airline numbers through December 2022 are available on the BTS website.