A decade-long reform. Agreement among EU institutions on single European airspace

Brussels -After an over 10-year stalemate, something is moving on the Single European Sky reform. EU institutions have reached a provisional agreement to reorganize airspace management, which is too fragmented and increasingly busy, with some 30,000 flights a day.

The goal of the package of amendments to the Single European Sky regulation – that the Commission proposed back in 2013 – is to improve the performance and organization of air navigation, increasing its capacity while reducing costs and seeking to reduce aviation’s impact on the environment and climate. With airspace fragmented into a patchwork of 27 different control jurisdictions,  aircraft often take inefficient routes, flying an average of 49 kilometers longer than strictly necessary, according to European Commission estimates.

“The current nationalistic airspace architecture hinders progress, leading to longer flights, increased emissions, and unnecessary costs,” said the rapporteur for the European Parliament, the EPP’s Marian-Jean Marinescu, on the sidelines of the agreement. The new rules finally pave the way to improve climate and environmental performance of airspace management by extending, in particular, binding environmental targets for terminal services and modulating charges to incentivize better environmental performance. According to the agreement, the EU will establish an “independent, permanent, and professional” performance review panel to advise the Commission on performance and charging scheme implementation. Funding for the expert group will come from the EU budget. Member states will designate a national supervisory authority to assess airlines’ compliance with financial sustainability requirements and the organizational structure.

The reform clarifies that “air navigation service providers and the national supervisory authority may be part of the same organization, provided they are functionally separate and meet independence requirements.” EU countries’ supervisory authorities will assess with the Commission — and the independent Performance Review Board — the performance of airlines “while respecting the principles of subsidiarity and proportionality.”The agreement also aims to provide a tool for airspace users to reduce civil aviation’s environmental impact. Through the introduction of mandatory modulation of route charges, designed to encourage citizens to support improvements in climate and environmental performance, such as the use of the most fuel-efficient routes available or increased use of alternative, clean propulsion technologies, after a cost-benefit analysis determines that such modulation is feasible and presents added value.

The EU Council presidency, represented in the inter-institutional trialogues by the Belgian Minister of Mobility, Georges Gilkinet, said it was “very pleased” with an outcome that “will enable important progress to be made in reducing CO² emissions from the aviation sector and will give member states more tools to limit the nuisance generated by aviation activity.” A first step to “help the sector achieve carbon neutrality.” Before coming into force, the reform, expected since 2013, will be submitted to the Council and European Parliament for formal approval.