3 December 2010

The committee of experts from European Member States have unanimously agreed the performance targets for the Single European Sky (SES), presented by the European Commission (EC) in the areas of environment, capacity/delays, and cost-efficiency for the period 2012 to 2014. The package will deliver significant safety improvements, fewer delays, lower costs and reduced CO2 emissions. It has been estimated that airspace users are expected to save £288 million (€340 million) per year or more than £849 million (€1 billion) over the whole period, while at the same time harmful CO2 emissions will be reduced by 500,000 tons a year.

 Transport Commissioner, Siim Kallas, stated that in line with the discussions held in the Transport Council, the SES has achieved a key milestone in its implementation with this agreement on ambitious but achievable performance targets. Savings of more than £849 million (€1 billion) will be delivered, with everyone sharing in the benefits: passengers, companies and the environment.

 The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has criticised Governments for setting the cost efficiency performance targets at 3.5% annual improvement for 2012-2014, which should be stronger. Europe’s independent Performance Review Board (PRB) recommended earlier this year that a 4.5% cost reduction target should be set for the 2012-2014 period. However, the performance target that was agreed was set at 3.5% annual improvement for 2012-2014, which the International Air Transport Association (IATA) described as supporting the status quo and not a target that will drive change.

 http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=IP/10/1660

http://www.iata.org/pressroom/pr/Pages/2010-12-03-01.aspx