Full house for the sustainable aviation summit in Toulouse
Posted 4 Feb. 2022 at 06:34 PMUpdated 4 Feb. 2022 at 09:53 PM
Bet won for the “Toulouse aviation summit” and its main promoter, the Minister of Transport Jean-Baptiste Djebbari. Despite an organization complicated by the health crisis, the meeting managed to cast a wide net, well beyond the ministers of the 27 countries of the European Union.
Its main subject, the “Toulouse Declaration on the sustainable development and decarbonization of aviation”, a text which sets the objective of gradually bringing air transport to carbon neutrality by 2050, was mentioned by 42 States – including the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Morocco, and several dozen professional associations and organizations representing all the aviation trades.
Next step: ICAO
In the ranks of the “supporters” of this declaration, the main French players Airbus, Air France-KLM, Dassault Aviation, Safran, Thales, ATR, the ADP group, who had already taken a collective position in favor of this 2050 objective. also the association of European airports, the European association of aeronautics and space companies, ASD, the association of European companies A4E, regional companies ERA, air traffic control bodies CANSO…
This is enough to push the European Commission to accelerate the implementation of an incentive policy for the production of sustainable fuels for aviation, called as the best current tool for decarbonization in the sector. But also and above all, enough to weigh heavily enough to get a resolution passed at the next assembly of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), which would universalize this objective of carbon neutrality by 2050.
Technological challenge
A goal that may seem distant and non-committal, but which already poses serious technological challenges and which is not yet unanimous at the global level, China having itself set a deadline of 2060. , the adoption of a date in 2050 would go hand in hand with the adoption of a progressive calendar, accompanied by a roadmap in the ramp-up of the production of sustainable fuels for aviation. So many potentially binding subjects for the States that will commit to them.
In wanting to set a course and a roadmap, the European Union and more particularly France are trying to avoid endangering their aviation ecosystem with a more or less authoritarian and broad limitation of traffic in airports, demanded by some NGOs like Greenpeace. This could favor other less virtuous models from an environmental point of view, particularly Chinese.