Bombardier's future as a major player in the passenger jet business could rest on its new CSeries aircraft. The first flight has been delayed from December until as late as next June, and a key Chinese fuselage supplier fell down on the job. In 2013, Bombardier needs the CSeries to fly and customers to buy. Chinese

Just as the aluminum industry profits by turning one soda can into another, aircraft manufacturers are waiting for the day when composite scrap from their assembly lines, or parts reclaimed at an aircraft's end-of-life, can be made flyable again.

Asian investors continue to take big stakes in the aircraft leasing market. A consortium of three Chinese investors plans to close on a deal to acquire the International Lease Finance Corp. That follows earlier sales of Jackson Square Aviation and the Royal Bank of Scotland's aircraft leasing business to Japanese buyers and Singapore Aircraft Leasing Enterprise's acquisition by the Bank of China.

They have different approaches, but the same aim: to reduce significantly the fuel burned when commercial aircraft taxi. Whether it is a semi-autonomous tow-tug or electric taxiing via powered nose or main wheels, systems are being developed to reduce fuel consumption and emissions during ground operations. WheelTug and Parker Aerospace hope to certificate a powered-nosewheel taxiing system for the Airbus A320 and Boeing 737 in 2013, promising an 80% reduction in fuel burn over using engine power.

Responding to the dramatic inroads made by carbon-fiber compositesinto aircraft structures, metals suppliers say their latest lightweight aluminum-lithium alloys can fully replace conventional aluminum and rival the benefits of composites in clean-sheet designs. As direct replacements for traditional aluminum, the new alloys' lower density provides a 3-6% weight reduction, but in new designs that can take advantage of the material's greater stiffness and corrosion resistance, the savingcan reach 25%.

In the drive to reduce aircraft fuel consumption and emissions, the traditional jet-fuel burning auxiliary power unit (APU) is being targeted for replacement by a clean-operating fuel cell, which only emits water vapor. In 2012, Boeing flew a regenerative fuel cell in its 737 EcoDemonstrator. Developed by Japan's IHI Aerospace, the fuel cell generated electricity and was “recharged” by the engines, surplus power being used to split water into oxygen and hydrogen, with the hydrogen then used in the fuel cell.

Widebody operators face a new supply and demand paradigm.

North Korea's successful launch of a satellite in December after 14 years of attempts put the hermit kingdom one step closer toward deploying an intercontinental ballistic missile. And Iran's nuclear weapons program—and the threat of an Israeli attack to cripple it—will keep tensions simmering in the Middle East.