U.S. states strive to exceed global aviation emissions standards

WASHINGTON / MONTREAL, Oct.6 (Reuters) – U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration is set to exceed global standards designed to cut emissions from flights, as pressure mounts to limit the industry’s greenhouse gases, five said States the White House in a letter viewed by Reuters.

Major aircraft and engine makers joined airlines this week in pledging to a non-binding goal of net zero emissions by 2050, but environmentalists say governments need to step up regulatory efforts to ensure that these objectives are effective.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is expected to apply global aircraft emissions standards to planes at U.S. domestic airports, a letter from states consulted by Reuters to White House National Climate Advisor Gina McCarthy said, to the EPA and the Federal Aviation Administration.

The Biden administration did not immediately comment.

The EPA is expected to get ahead of the United Nations aviation agency in approving standards to reduce greenhouse gases and air pollution from new aircraft engines entering service after 2030, the report said. letter from Illinois, Massachusetts, Oregon, California and Minnesota and the International Clean Transportation Council (ICCT).

The latest US policy “favors ambitious targets and tax credits (for sustainable aviation fuel) over legally binding GHG targets,” the letter said. Last month, the White House announced it was targeting a 20% drop in aviation emissions by 2030.

But in seeking to go it alone on aviation standards, the United States would deviate from the system of global standards developed by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

The United Nations agency sets global standards on everything from runway markings to accident investigation.

“The United States should stop outsourcing aircraft emissions policy to ICAO,” the letter said from the California Air Resource Board and other state attorneys general.

“Airlines aspire to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions to zero, but the United States does not yet have policies to support this goal,” said Andrei Kodjak, executive director of Washington-based ICCT. . “It is high time that the Biden administration adopted standards to accelerate the development of low-carbon aircraft and engines.

In its final days in office, the Trump administration finalized emissions standards for new aircraft that a dozen U.S. states contested as being too lenient.

States and ICCT propose that the EPA begin work to establish new emissions rules for new aircraft engines entering service in or after 2030.

Reporting by David Shepardson in Washington and Allison Lampert in Montreal. Editing by Gerry Doyle

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