FAA to change how some planes land in effort to cut emissions

In an effort to cut emissions, the Federal Aviation Administration announced it's changing the way some planes land at U.S. airports.

In an effort to cut emissions, the Federal Aviation Administration announced it's changing the way some planes land at U.S. airports.

Currently, most planes that land at airports descend in a stair-step method, where aircraft repeatedly level off and power up the engines during the descent. Under the agency's new 42 Optimized Profile Descents, or OPDs, planes will instead descend from cruising altitude to the runway in a smoother, continuous path with engines set at near idle.

"If you just think about what takes more energy, walking down the stairs or sliding down a slide, that's basically what the plane is doing," FAA spokesperson Matthew Lehner said in an interview with ABC News.

The move is part of the agency's work to achieve a net-zero greenhouse gas emissions aviation sector by 2050 -- part of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg's U.S. Aviation Climate Action Plan announced at the United Nations Climate Change Conference last November.