Story ID: 
Business Aviation Faces Sustainability Push
By: Curt Epstein
Caption: Marc Ehudin, GAMA's director of governmental affairs detailed the demands being placed on the aviation industry to improve its sustainability efforts.
Word Count: 346
"There is a very strong push to force commercial and business aviation to be more sustainable, to do more than what we've been doing," said Marc Ehudin, GAMA's director of governmental affairs. Speaking yesterday at the California edition of AIN's Sustainable Flight Department forum, he detailed the demands that are being placed on the aviation industry to improve its sustainability efforts, which have been shaped by voluntary declarations such as business aviation's commitment on climate change first issued in 2009 and revised in 2015 and 2021. That document's goals included reducing CO2 emissions 50 percent by 2050 relative to 2005 levels and achieving carbon-neutral growth from 2020, as well as improving fuel efficiency by 2 percent per year from 2010 until 2020. Ehudin noted that between 2015 and 2020 the business aviation industry's CO2 emissions were 2.4 million tonnes less than levels forecast in 2015.

Despite meeting or being on track to meet such goals, the industry now faces new proposed legislation such as the EU's Fit for 55 package of proposals that aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 55 percent by 2030 versus 1990 levels. It includes a mandate for fuel suppliers to deliver a certain percentage to major EU airports (which may not include business aviation airports), a new tax on non-sustainable aviation fuel starting in 2023, and an overall goal of making Europe the world's first climate-neutral continent by 2050. A vote on the package is scheduled for this summer.

In the UK, the Jet Zero Council—a consortium of government and industry—has similar goals, with a focus on achieving net-zero aviation by 2050. Plans for its implementation are expected to be published soon, according to Ehudin.

And in the U.S., the multi-trillion-dollar Build Back Better Act, which included a so-called blender's tax credit in incentivize the production and sale of sustainable aviation fuel, has stalled in Congress, Ehudin, a former Capital Hill staffer, expects a smaller package to be proposed by the Democrats. "These days with Congress, its just difficult to get any major piece of legislation passed," he said. "Generally, Congress doesn't consider and approve tax legislation in an election year."