Does Europe Want To Kill It’s Air Transport?
We may ask ourselves this question given the constraints imposed by the European Union but also directly by European states on their air transport. Long gone are the days when this activity was the pride of the continent. Between the 1960s and 1980s, European companies represented the jewel of the Old Continent, which was in the process of rebuilding itself after having spent centuries in internal struggles that almost destroyed it. It was the time when the national carriers: Air France, Lufthansa, British Airways, Alitalia, SAS, KLM and so on had developed the world’s leading international network, far ahead of even the United States, which was largely concentrated on its domestic space. Times have changed. Traditional operators have not been able to manage the arrival of “low-cost” carriers, which they saw as enemies instead of considering them as fantastic market developers. Let’s face it, airlines were the first to create their own difficulties.
But as they struggled with new low-cost competitors, government authorities, instead of helping them, continued to slow down their expansion. The first difficulty came in the contest of airspace management. The latter is fragmented by its geopolitical geography, each state being the owner of its aeronautical environment. While it has been possible to create a single currency whose benefits cannot be over celebrated, it has been impossible to create and manage a common civil airspace until now. The design of air routes no longer matches aircraft capabilities, and the loss of time is estimated at 8 minutes on average per flight, which is also an aggravating factor for fuel consumption and CO₂ emissions. In addition, the entire European area is penalised every time an air traffic control strike affects any of the states. One may wonder why governments and the European Commission have not managed to address this difficulty, even if it must be admitted that it is not easy.
Ecological pressure has also taken hold of governments, and they, through a curious demagogy, have placed the burden on air transport, which is accused of all evils, even though it is one of the few activities that has become aware of the importance of achieving carbon neutrality. Instead of supporting the necessary transition, the response of the political authorities has been to force operators to reduce their offer, without having consulted consumers for their opinion. This is why some airports such as Amsterdam or London Heathrow, or even Paris Orly and others that I am forgetting, have had to reduce or cap the number of aircraft movements even though their facilities allowed them to be expanded. We have also seen states outright ban air services when rail allows them to be replaced in 2 hours and 30 minutes.
At the same time, new and important traffic rights were allocated to Gulf carriers, such as Qatar Airways. I note that the Gulf Emirates have clearly perceived the political and economic importance of supporting the development of their airlines. We cannot blame them for that, but we would have liked the European authorities to do the same instead of penalising them. I also note that the latest European regulation on air passenger rights will impose new obligations on airlines, if it is adopted by the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union.
It is paradoxical, to say the least, to see that everyone agrees that air transport should achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, which, by the way, is impossible without a technological leap that we do not see taking shape, and at the same time, that we are clipping the wings of this activity. The investments required to decarbonise the air industry are prodigious, probably several trillion dollars, and we will have to find the resources to finance them. Where can this money come from if not from air transport itself—in other words, from passengers who will have to accept serious increases in fares that will produce increased profits for carriers, a large part of which will have to be devoted to research to achieve environmental targets. For this to happen, European air transport will need not only the neutrality of governments but their support, not financial, but administrative.
Without strong cooperation between all the players in the aviation sector and the states that hold the regulations and air traffic control, it will not be possible to make sufficient progress. Everyone must take their responsibilities, first and foremost the European Commission.
