The General Aviation Manufacturers Association (GAMA) today warmly welcomed the agreement by the Committee on Aviation Environmental Protection (CAEP) of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) on a metric to measure CO2 emissions of aircraft types with varying technologies.  GAMA President and CEO Pete Bunce stated, “This agreement is to be celebrated.  It demonstrates the seriousness with which the aviation community and the business aviation sector in particular take their environmental responsibility.  Technical experts from GAMA member companies and from operators represented by the International Business Aviation Council (IBAC) have worked tirelessly at ICAO over the last three years to ensure that business aviation would be part of the solution.”

The agreement was announced at CAEP’s Steering Group meeting on July 11 in St. Petersburg, Russian Federation.  The CO2 metric includes, as ICAO Council President Roberto Kobeh Gonzalez stated, “factors which account for fuselage geometry, maximum take-off weight and fuel burn performance at three different cruise conditions…” 

The metric was developed collaboratively by ICAO member states, aircraft and engine manufacturers, operators, environmental NGOs and other stakeholders.  ICAO technical experts now proceed to the next phase of the process of developing a CO2 standard.  This involves the development of certification procedures and the scope of applicability.

“With this agreement, we are confident that an appropriate CO2 standard will emerge from ICAO that is technically feasible, environmentally beneficial, cost-effective, and that considers the interdependencies of other environmental standards in aviation,” Bunce concluded.