Aviation Supporting the Sustainable Development Goals

Aviation Fuel/Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF)International Sustainability

October 03, 2017

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(Aviator/Air Transport Action Group) The Air Transport Action Group (ATAG) today released a new report at its Global Sustainable Aviation Summit, taking place in Geneva. Flying in Formation is a guide for the air transport industry to help understand the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals in an aviation context.

ATAG Executive Director, Michael Gill said: “We hope Flying in Formation will provide ideas for how companies and partners across the sector can build the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) into their own corporate strategies. Whilst the SDGs are developed by and for governments, there are a number of reasons why companies also need to respond.

“Following the SDGs makes good business sense. Businesses thrive in societies with healthy, prosperous and stable populations, clear rules of engagement and open borders. Governments will also increasingly make legislation and regulations that follow the themes of the SDGs, particularly in emerging and developing economies. And the SDGs provide a very convenient template for a business to look at its own sustainability agenda.

Gill said that companies do not need to initiate actions for all 17 SDGs when shaping their strategy, but they should at least consider them: “Whilst there are actions being undertaken across all 17 SDGs by partners in the industry, we certainly have a major global influence in seven of them and at least some influence in a further eight. The leadership role industry is showing on climate change should be used as a model for industry action in other areas. We are a unique sector that has the power to effectively transform the world through partnerships and collaboration.

The report can be downloaded at www.aviationbenefits.org/SDGs. It looks at the importance of the SDGs, how aviation is already working to help deliver the SDGs already and some ideas for how air transport companies and governments can further that opportunity. READ MORE Download Report

Global aviation is a driver of sustainable development, bringing together people, businesses and communities and supporting trade and tourism. (Aviation Benefits Beyond Borders)

ATAG Summit: Michael Gill Speech (Aviation Benefits Beyond Borders)

Excerpt from Michael Gill Speech: The Sustainable Development Goals are designed to set the development agenda until 2030, ensuring that governments, civil society and businesses are all working in the same direction on some of these key issues.

Flying in formation, if you like.

So, the SDGs allow development frameworks to be set for government action, but why are they important for business? There are a few reasons:

It makes good business sense. There is a clear correlation between a company’s sustainability track record and its financial performance. Businesses thrive in societies with healthy, prosperous and stable populations, clear rules of engagement and open borders.
Governments will increasingly make legislation and regulation that follow the themes of the SDGs and in areas that they have not previously had to consider. This will particularly be the case in emerging and developing economies.
And the SDGs provide a very convenient template for a business to look at its own sustainability agenda – now, companies may not need to initiate actions for all 17 SDGs when shaping their strategy, but they should at least consider a number of them.

As a global business sector, we too have to look at the role we play.

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I would like to take a few minutes to look at a few of the SDGs in detail.

The first is SDG 5: gender equality.

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With SDG 7, affordable and clean energy, we are at the very start of a cleaner energy revolution within our sector as well.

Roger and his bird friends have always fueled themselves with renewable energy, but it has taken us a little longer to get the use of sustainable aviation fuel off the ground.

Today, over 40,000 commercial flights have already been made on sustainable fuel and we expect that number to grow exponentially as more airports join the four that are already providing this new source of fuel to airlines through their normal supply systems: Oslo, Los Angeles, Stockholm and Bergen.

The progress is remarkable, but the challenge remains to make this a regular part of our fuel supply. We will hear all about that challenge and how it can be overcome later this morning.

Next week in Mexico City, ICAO will host the Second Conference on Aviation and Alternative Fuels where it will present a vision for how the development of sustainable aviation fuel will progress.

We fully support ICAO’s vision of 2% of global aviation fuel being sustainable by 2025. That Vision is within touching distance and achievable.

We should then assess how the work to get there has progressed before setting ourselves – and governments – a longer-term goal for even more significant uptake.

The analysis shows that up to 100% of the fuel in 2050 could be from sustainable sources with the right policy measures in place…

It is vital that governments get on board with this and we urge all states to throw their support behind these new sources of fuel for aviation.

It is important for a number of reasons, the most pressing of which is climate change, SDG13. READ MORE