HOUSTON (AP) -- A new bonus program at Continental Airlines would allow some top executives to receive more than double their base pay, but officials say it's uncertain how much will ever be paid out.

A committee of the Houston-based carrier's board of directors approved the new Continental incentive deal earlier this year, aiming to reward high ranking executives based on company performance.

The panel said it was needed as an incentive for key management this year, "which the committee expects to be a year of significant restructuring of the U.S. airline industry."

Air carriers, including Continental, are continuing to make budget cuts in the face of weak travel activity. Most major airlines already have announced hundreds of millions of dollars in first-quarter losses.

Houston-based Continental already has a bonus program in place. But committee members felt that it was unlikely any bonus payments would be made this year under that plan.

The new incentives, called the "Special Bonus Program for Key Management for 2003," are aimed at rewarding high-ranking executives by performance. But a spokesman said it is unlikely that any bonuses will be paid out under the new program, either.

"In the current environment with massive labor concessions being achieved by our competitors, there is a good chance this performance-based program will pay zero," Continental spokesman Ned Walker told the Houston Chronicle in Friday's editions.

Last month, the surprise disclosure of retention bonuses and extra pension benefits for top executives at Fort Worth-based American Airlines nearly scuttled the airline's effort to secure concessions from its labor unions.

Bonuses at American, which were to be granted to executives who promised to stay until 2005, have since been rescinded. The unions eventually agreed to concessions.