The Prince of Wales has toured British Airways’ engineering base in Cardiff.

He was shown first-hand the changes, large and small, which the airline is making as it works towards more sustainable flying.

In front of more than 400 BA staff, his royal highness was shown the nose-to-tail focus on sustainability from the heavy-weight investments in new fuel-efficient aircraft, to the smallest detail of using a light-weight solder in aircraft repairs, bringing down the carbon footprint of each journey.

British Airways is forensically assessing its entire operation to find the little changes which add up to a big change of direction.

These include the airline investing in a further 73 fuel-efficient and quieter aircraft to arrive before 2024.

British Airways chief executive, Alex Cruz, who led the tour, said: “It has been an honour to showcase our work in this area to his royal highness today.

“Every decision we make at British Airways now starts with a simple question: what does that mean for our sustainability aspiration?

“We’re now offsetting carbon emissions on all our flights within the UK, and were the first airline group to commit to achieving net zero carbon emissions by 2050.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do, but keeping an eye on the detail as well as the bigger picture is the only way to get there.”