Virtual meeting, June 18, 2021.- The Forty-seventh Meeting of the Group of Experts on Political, Economic and Legal Issues of Air Transport of the Latin American Civil Aviation Commission, CLAC (GEPEJTA/47V) was held on this occasion virtually, in the context of the current global health crisis of COVID 19.
The activity was specifically determined to address the issues of the environment and climate change, for which the State of Guatemala is responsible for CLAC’s environmental Macro-task and for which COCESNA has been technically supporting for several years through the Transportation Management Air and Environment.
It was attended by important regional aviation players such as Mr. Francis Argueta, General Director of Civil Aeronautics of Guatemala and Second Vice President of CLAC, Mr. Juan Carlos Salazar, Director of AEROCIVIL of Colombia and ICAO Secretary-Elect Mr. Kevin Welch, United States Federal Aviation Administration Environmental Coordinator, Ms. Jane Hupe, ICAO Director of Environment, Mr. Alfredo Iglesias, European Union Environmental Specialist, Mr. Jaime Binder, Secretary General of CLAC, Mr. Giovanni Tobar, Manager of Air Transport and Environment of COCESNA, representatives of the various Civil Aviation Authorities of the Latin American region of the industry and aviation associations such as IATA and ALTA.
After the different interventions of the experts, the importance of CORSIA was measured, as the first global mechanism for the reduction and compensation of emissions of an economic sector, as well as the importance of participating in it, to maintain its integrity and make this a robust mechanism as it was raised in its design.
Likewise, in terms of sustainable aviation fuels (SAF), the potential that the Latin American region has for this type of initiative was highlighted, and examples of the application of appropriate technologies were presented. The importance of as one of the main measures promoted by ICAO to achieve the aspirational goals in environmental and climate change matters of the international aviation sector was pondered, indicating that different SAF production projects are currently being developed. In addition, it was linked that these are a very important measure for the decarbonization of the aviation sector.