IATA is aiming for 1b passengers to travel on flights powered by a mix of jet fuel and sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) by 2025, although the industry body said hitting this target will require government action. “The momentum for sustainable aviation fuels is now unstoppable. From one flight in 2008, we passed the threshold of 100,000 flights in 2017, and we expect to hit 1 million flights during 2020. But that is still just a drop in the ocean compared to what we want to achieve. We want 1 billion passengers to have flown on a SAF-blend flight by 2025,” IATA DG Alexandre de Juniac said. IATA estimates that a flight, powered only by sustainable fuel, would be 80% more emissions efficient. As things stand, IATA forecasts that half a billion passengers will have flown on a SAF-blend powered flight by 2025. Doubling this figure by 2025 will require policy that supports the scale-up in sustainable-fuel production. IATA wants governments to incentivize SAF production, enabling better competition with the automotive biofuels market, through loan guarantees, grants for production facilities and R&D funding. De Juniac also called on policymakers to take a more harmonized approach to sustainable fuels, bringing together transport and energy policies, while also coordinating with agriculture and military departments.<br/>
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The chairman of the US House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee said on Tuesday there is not enough support in Congress to move forward with a plan backed by President Donald Trump to privatize the air traffic control system. Republican Representative Bill Shuster said that the "air traffic control reform provisions did not reach the obvious level of support needed to pass Congress." But Shuster vowed to work with the Senate to move forward with legislation to reauthorize the FAA, which expires at the end of March. Without authorization the FAA would not be able to collect aviation taxes and many of its employees would have to be laid off. In June, Trump unveiled a plan to privatize air traffic control in what he said would modernize the system and lower flying costs. Democrats contended it would hand control of a key asset to special interests and big airlines, and some Republicans opposed it.<br/>
President Donald Trump has reached an informal deal with Boeing to provide the next generation of presidential aircraft, the White House says. Deputy press secretary Hogan Gidley said Tuesday that the president negotiated a $3.9 billion "fixed-price contract" for the new planes, known as Air Force One when the president is on board. It follows years of negotiations between Boeing and the US Air Force — and Trump's personal intervention since his election. In December 2016, Trump tweeted that costs for the program were "out of control, more than $4b." He added, "Cancel order!" Boeing CE Dennis Muilenburg met multiple times with Trump to discuss the Air Force One contract, most recently last week. Boeing said it is "proud to build the next generation of Air Force One, providing American Presidents with a flying White House at outstanding value to taxpayers." "President Trump negotiated a good deal on behalf of the American people," it said. Gidley said the agreement would save taxpayers more than $1.4b, but it remains unclear exactly how that number was calculated.<br/>
The winter storm that caused chaos at Kennedy International Airport in January roared up the Eastern Seaboard, dumping more than a foot of snow on Boston Logan International Airport and sending water from Boston Harbor flooding onto the airport’s grounds. The high winds and swirling snow caused Logan, like Kennedy, to shut down for nearly an entire day. But Logan reopened the next morning and operated normally through the weekend — except for having to accommodate six planeloads of passengers diverted there from Kennedy, which remained paralyzed. The first storm of 2018 created such a disaster at Kennedy that a former federal transportation secretary is investigating all that went wrong. At Boston’s international airport, the storm was a one-day event soon to be forgotten. At Logan, there were no inbound planes stranded on the tarmac for hours, helpless and awaiting rescue. No scheduled overseas arrivals had to turn around in the air or reroute to other airports. Hordes of travelers were not separated from their luggage for days or weeks. Why were the experiences at these two major American airports, separated by only about 200 miles, so dramatically different? The answer may be that, though both airports are run by public authorities, they are managed in far disparate ways. Story <br/>
Volantio, the Atlanta-based startup that helped United manage its overbookings in the wake of the Dr. Dao scandal last summer, is telling investors it’s cracked a seemingly impossible code: generate more money for airlines while improving customer satisfaction. Eight months into its product lifespan, the company—which helps airlines preventatively rejigger inventory by offering buyouts to flexible passengers—closed a $2.6m series B funding round in February. The monetary sum is less impressive than the venture capitalists contributing to it: On board are three of the world’s biggest aviation investors, which rarely join hands: International Airlines Group (IAG), JetBlue Technology Ventures (JTV), and Qantas Ventures. One reason they all bit: to avoid the type of public relations nightmare that smacked United last year, when the carrier forcibly removed a doctor from an oversold aircraft, leaving him with a concussion and a broken nose. Volantio’s technology could have preemptively sorted passengers onto different flights so the airline wouldn’t been positioned to oversell in the first place. As of now, airlines are handling re-bookings manually. But Volantio’s applications are far more varied—and consumer-friendly—than just that. Airlines are interested in the platform because it offers a variety of solutions for everyday pain points. <br/>
Capital requirements for the airline sector are flying higher than ever before, driven by strong passenger traffic and aircraft fleet demand, transforming aviation into a mainstream finance and asset class. According to a new report released today from FlightGlobal. The growth projected for global passenger aircraft fleet will require capital exceeding US$120b annually, reaching approximately half a trillion dollars over the next four years, to fund new aircraft alone. During that period (2018-21), the world’s aircraft manufacturers are scheduled to deliver almost 8,000 aircraft – an increase of approximately 30% over the previous four-year period. Funding this large and growing fleet requirement was once the domain of investment banks, but the considerable sums needed are unlikely to be met in future solely by these capital providers as the aviation sector would weigh too highly on their balance sheets. These growing capital requirements are likely lead to diversification of funding and highlights the compelling aviation investment case to new sources of capital. <br/>