14 DAY TRIAL // Google has apparently been buying off cheap fuel for the company’s executives’ planes from NASA, but this has been happening by mistake, it seems.
According to a report from NASA’s inspector general, it was a misunderstanding that led to Google buying fuel at a cheaper price. The company may be forced to compensate NASA for the difference.
Here’s how it happened. Apparently, back in 2007, NASA’s Ames Research Centre started leasing out space in one of its aircraft hangers to H211. This private company manages the planes owned and leased by Google execs Larry Page, Sergey Brin, and Eric Schmidt. The fleet includes a Boeing 757 and 767, a Dassult alpha jet and three Gulfstream 5.
The Dassult, which is classified as a “light attack jet,” is regularly being lent to NASA for no charge and the space agency conducts various scientific researches.
The H211 was exempted from a series of taxes that the company would have paid under normal circumstances if it had chosen a different type of airport. The fuel ended up costing half of the regular price.
So, it shelled out between $3.05 and $3.81 (€2.21 - €2.76) per gallon, instead of the usual $7.01 - $7.44 (€5.09 - €5.40) on the airport in 2012. By mistake, planes belonging to H211 were also provided with cheaper fuel even if their flights had no connection to NASA’s research.
“While this arrangement did not cause a loss to NASA or DLA-Energy, it resulted in considerable savings for H211. Specifically, we calculated that since inception of its lease H211 paid approximately $3.3 million to $5.3 million (€2.39 million - €3.85 million) less for fuel supplied by DLA-Energy than it would have paid to buy fuel at market rates,” the report indicates.
Well, it’s unlikely that Google’s execs minded paying less for fuel, but now that it’s in the open, we could be hearing about this again soon.