European national aviation policies differ between countries. Find out what’s impacting business aviation and the outlook for 2024 in this podcast with European Business Aviation Association COO Robert Baltus and Aviation Week executive editor of MRO and business aviation, Lee Ann Shay. This episode was produced by Jeremy Kariuki and Andrea Copley-Smith.
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Rush Transcript
Lee Ann Shay: Welcome to this BCA podcast. I'm Lee Ann Shay, Aviation Week's Executive Editor of MRO and Business Aviation and I'm here with Robert Baltus, who is the COO of the European Business Aviation Association which represents more than 700 member companies, including operators, manufacturers, airports, and FBOs. Welcome Robert.
Robert Baltus: Good morning.
Lee Ann Shay: Good morning. Now you oversee a team who monitors and analyzes European aviation policies, but given that policies vary from country to country, what are some of the main issues happening in Europe?
Robert Baltus: Well, actually a lot of people think there's one Europe, and if we look at regulation for instance, like with aviation regulation with EASA, it is all set on European level. The problem with it is that all the national states have the final responsibility and they have to implement the rules. So we see there's, on the national level, variations on implementation. Now, that's something we've been working on for years, but in the last few months and year, we've seen a lot of activities on the national level whereby member states are trying to be smarter and better than the rest. So they introduce all kind of new rules and regulations and taxations specifically aimed against business aviation.
Lee Ann Shay: And specifically airports. What are some of the main airport issues that you're dealing with?
Robert Baltus: Well, what we've seen in Amsterdam, Amsterdam out of the blue, decided to refuse any business aviation to go forward. Fortunately, after a lot of lobbying work by the EBAA and some of our members, we have been able to reduce that, and now people are still allowed to fly to Amsterdam, but it's much less than before. So this is an airport who, by themselves, decide that they want to get rid of business aviation, and it's now happening at other airports. We've seen a similar thing at Eindhoven Airport in the Netherlands, Dublin Airport is also considering something like this and in a different way, we've seen, for instance, taxation being put up specifically against business aviation in Portugal. So the EBAA is extremely busy in making sure that our members will continue to have access to all these places. And also that all the taxation is first of all fair and most of all is being used for the purpose or the big ID behind it, which is making the industry more sustainable.
Lee Ann Shay: The aviation industry, speaking of sustainability, represents 2% of all emissions, and business aviation specifically is even less, about 0.04%, yet business aviation is facing a lot of scrutiny. What's your outlook for 2024?
Robert Baltus: Well, I think we're in a perfect storm. I think we all understand the need for sustainable aviation fuel. So as an industry, we really want to move to become more sustainable by using SAF and only business aviation, also commercial aviation. And the issue we're facing is that there's not sufficient SAF available, and SAF might be available in some countries and not in others. It's not available in sufficient quantities. So politicians are really demanding we use more SAF. As an industry, we want to use more SAF, but it's just not there yet. And if it's there, it's generally not in the right place. So that's why it's a perfect storm, all with good intentions because I think both the politicians, society and us as an industry, we want to do it, but the agenda or the timetable is not in our favor for now.
Lee Ann Shay: Well, speaking of SAF, the European Parliament recently passed a roadmap for increasing SAF in the EU, but a book and claim system was not included. Do you think this could change in the near future, or is this a done deal?
Robert Baltus: No, I think we're fairly positive about the latest developments. Just a year ago, the Commission was really against book and claim because as I said, there was risk for fraud, et cetera, et cetera, and we told them we appreciated that there's risk of fraud hence we need proper, solid system. We need a system to be able to have SAF available in countries where it physically cannot be transported to. So you need a mechanism, a safe mechanism like book and claim to be able to do so. Now, the latest developments are really encouraging. The Commission has brought in a consultant to look at different options, and the EBAA, together with other industry partners, is working with them to make sure that there is going to be one system which is going to be safe, easy to use, but also ensures that SAF will be available as soon as possible to our industry as a whole.
Lee Ann Shay: That sounds like positive developments.
Robert Baltus: It is. It is. Again, like I said before, we're in a perfect storm from an availability perspective. Therefore, the next two years, one year, two years, it might look messy, but it will, I think, it is going in the right direction.
Lee Ann Shay: Well, that sounds good. Well, Robert, we've run out of time, but thank you so much for your insights and your time. Really appreciate it. And don't miss the next episode by subscribing to the BCA podcast wherever you listen to them. And one last request. If you're listening in Apple Podcasts and would like to support our podcast, please leave us a star rating or write a review. Thank you so much.
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