New rules may limit noise, but there will be a lot of shouting
David Learmount/OPERATIONS & SAFETY EDITOR
The environment is set to become the most fraught and internationally divisive issue affecting the global aviation industry. This will not happen overnight, but the coming year will see proponents of more stringent environmental measures squaring up to those who would delay the issues indefinitely.
Europe will provide the lead among those who want to see aviation pay for its undoubted detrimental impact on the environment. Meanwhile, across the Atlantic, the USA will fight to keep aviation free of most forms of constraint, except for those concerning noise, where domestic lobbyists are gaining ground.
These two world forces are polarising, with Europe prepared to act unilaterally and the USA insisting that any action be approved by the International Civil Aviation Organisation, where the USA has the power to ensure that any "progress" (as defined by environmentalists) is reduced to a snail's pace.
Meanwhile, if Europe acts, European airlines can be expected to cry "foul" because they will be commercially disadvantaged, and to invoke the ICAO treaty. No new environmental proposals have been ratified at ICAO since October 1998. The 1997 Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change, the only existing statement of world environmental intent, entirely avoided the thorny aviation issue, resolving: "International aviation emissions were not included in the agreed targets because of the difficulties that had arisen over the methodologies for allocating these emissions."
Kyoto agreed that somebody should do something, but did not say exactly what, suggesting politely that parties should "pursue limitation or reduction of emissions of greenhouse gases-working through the International Civil Aviation Organisation." So the job has been dumped at ICAO's door, but ICAO is going to be too slow for Europe.
At the end of 1999, the European Union gave a straightforward indication of intent in its Communication on Air Transport and the Environment. The premise was that aviation should pay for polluting the environment, in the same way that road transport does through fuel taxes. Whether this is simply another source of income for national exchequers is not the issue. At present, commercial aviation fuel is not taxed at all, and neither is sales tax or value added tax charged directly on the price of passenger tickets.
Airport or departure tax is the nearest some states get to an aviation tax, and since this is a flat rate system, it cannot be said to relate pro rata to the pollution caused by long journeys compared with short ones. Environmental groups such as Friends of the Earth argue that aviation is actively subsidised by the taxpayer by remaining untaxed while other forms of transport (though not rail or buses) are.
Meanwhile, the UK Government has commissioned studies to quantify the "environmental costs" of aviation by valuing "externalities" such as the cost of noise and emissions to residents near an airport, taking into account the effects on the value of property and the cost of damage to health.
The UK has also recently indicated, in a statement by aviation minister Chris Mullin, that it is moving from a "predict and provide" approach (where, for example, an airport would be allowed to grow in line with demand) to a "demand managed" one (where demand might be suppressed using price and capacity constraints as "weapons"). A consultation document, launched by transport minister Lord Macdonald in December, hints at what the government thinks it can, or should, deliver - and despite a forecast doubling of demand in the next 15 years, this does not include unfettered growth in infrastructure provision (Flight International, 19 December 2000-1 January 2001). A white paper outlining UK aviation policy for the next 30 years is expected by the end of 2001.
Transatlantic differences have already been highlighted by the still active dispute over Stage 2 aircraft hushkitted to Stage 3 standards. The EU, of course, has acted to limit the scope for continued operation by these aircraft even where they comply with Stage 3, risking a trade war with the USA, which manufactures the world's hushkits and operates many more old jets than EU airlines do.
The dispute is to be adjudicated by ICAO, which in November threw out the EU contention that there is no case to answer. All ICAO environmental papers so far have accepted that new standards on noise and emissions should apply to new-build aircraft and should seek to consider the effect of new rules on the residual value of older aircraft. This contention is not going to remain unchallenged by Europe, but there is no sign that the USA will move. A compromise structured around the early introduction of Stage 4 regulations - still being framed - might be the only answer.
Source: Flight International
