OREANDA-NEWS. September 15, 2009. Aeroflot has joined the EU program for atmosphere CO2 concentration monitoring and presented its continuous emission monitoring system implementation roadmap to the German aviation authorities, reported the press-centre of Aeroflot.

As is announced, from 2012 the EU is implementing the CO2 emission quota system.  For the emission monitoring organization, each carrier is assigned to the aviation authorities of an EU country where it most frequently flies. In such a way, Aeroflot is assigned to Germany.

On January 01 2010, EU will begin emission control based on the produced reports. The CO2 emission reports will serve as a reference point for free quota allocation to each carrier. 

Based on these calculations, in 2012 the EU will distribute free quotas among carriers that will be able to buy the outstanding share if need be. The companies failing to meet the new requirements may face restrictions on flights to the European Union states, says the EU directive.
Aeroflot organized a committee for interaction with the EU aviation authorities on the issues of the European Parliament directive 2008/101/EU compliance. At the same time, Aeroflot takes into consideration the fact that the Russian Federation, like the most countries in the world, while being concerned with the environment protection problems, does not endorse EU’s unilateral restrictions departing both from the provisions of the Chicago Convention, and from air traffic agreements between countries. In these area, Aeroflot is guided first of all by the ICAO and IATA documents; the company has its own environmental strategy in place, and is consequently conducting a policy to drive down emissions through the use of a more energy-efficient air fleet, environmentally safe waste disposal and the use of environment-friendly materials.

Reference: In 1997, the Kyoto Protocol was signed which outlined the problem of reducing the concentration of greenhouse gases (incl. CO2) in the atmosphere. The European scheme for the distribution of commercial quotas for gas emission was introduced in 2005 for ground-based production enterprises. In February 2009, the European Parliament enacted directive No. 2008/101/EU to annex the air transport industry to the gas-emission quota trading program from 2012.

The economic purpose of this is to determine a maximum limit for greenhouse gas emission volume for a certain period of time and to distribute quotas for these emissions. The upper limit of the quota volume is supposed to gradually go down, while the members will have to pay fines for exceeding the assigned quota. Quotas of 15% will be auctioned, and the certificate prices will be determined by demand for them; 82% will be distributed free of charge; and 3 % will constitute a reserve for emerging air carriers. These shares will be calculated from the emissions for the base year, which was declared to be 2006.

In the long run, the companies must be reducing their emissions, in order to improve the economic efficiency of their business. The directive shall apply to all air carriers flying to the EU airports.