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Airbus executive calls for swift action to reduce industry's carbon emissions

"It is essential that we rise to the environmental challenge or, as an industry, we can fully expect that regulatory authorities and governments will take matters into their own hands."

Tom Enders, chief executive of Airbus

The aviation industry must act quickly to lower its own carbon dioxide emissions or face government regulation, the chief executive of European plane company Airbus wrote in a comment piece yesterday.

Writing in the Guardian daily, Tom Enders said that this year was a "moment of truth for aviation" where the industry could either take "significant action together ... or as the time we lost control of our destiny and left it to others to `solve' our challenges for us."

Enders acknowledged that the industry had "to do a lot more" but said that it had "also been doing a bad job at communicating both our progress on the environment and the fundamental role that aviation now plays in the world economy."

"It is essential that we rise to the environmental challenge or, as an industry, we can fully expect that regulatory authorities and governments will take matters into their own hands," he wrote. "We must come together and move to the forefront of eco-efficiency. We must and we can."

He said that European industry targets of cutting carbon dioxide emissions by 50 percent, nitrous oxides by 80 percent and noise by 50 percent by 2020 compared with technologies available in 2000 were "within reach."

Airbus announced earlier this month that it suffered an operating loss of US$1.4 billion last year despite record orders for its aircraft, forcing parent company EADS into the red.
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