Wizz Air has announced a £5 million ($6.22 million) investment in UK-based biofuel producer Firefly Green Fuels. The partnership will allow Wizz to supply up to 525,000 tonnes of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) to its UK operations for 15 years from 2028, the central European budget carrier says. The agreement has the potential to save 1.5 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent, it adds. The deal marks the first equity investment in SAF research and development for Wizz, which aims to reduce its carbon emissions per passenger/km by 25% by 2030. Firefly produces SAF using sewage sludge, a low-value waste product available in large quantities, as feedstock. More than 57 million tonnes of sewage sludge are produced in the UK each year, with the potential to produce 250,000 tonnes of SAF, Wizz notes. Firefly's SAF, which will be independently certified against the sustainability standard RSB, is expected to deliver a 90% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions compared to fossil jet fuel on a life cycle basis. "Firefly will facilitate a step change towards the future of air travel," Firefly Green Fuels' chief executive James Hygate says. "The feedstock, sewage sludge, is available in vast quantities globally and with Firefly we can put it to a truly beneficial use, reducing the use of fossil fuels in the hardest to decarbonise areas."

Boeing chief executive David Calhoun aims to keep the company's goal to accelerate 737 Max aircraft production, undeterred by both ongoing supply chain troubles and anticipated Max delivery delays amid a new flaw discovered in some newly-built jets. Calhoun has sought to provide clear expectations to help suppliers plan their budgets during the aviation sector recovery, so on 18 April he told the company's annual meeting of shareholders: "We are not changing the supplier master schedule, including any anticipated rate increases". Boeing seeks to increase Max production to 50 per month by 2025. The company ended March with a backlog of 3,585 orders for 737 type aircraft, after the airframer factored in cancellations, conversions and the uncertainty of fulfilment. Labour costs continue to rise as companies work to recruit and retain workers after downsizing during the Covid-19 pandemic. Supply chain difficulties are expected to continue during 2023, Calhoun says, adding: "We feel like the worst is behind us, and that we will slowly improve as we move into the next year." "We are comfortable holding buffer stock so that our supply chain can keep its pace," Calhoun says. "We don’t expect this issue to change our long-term guidance for 2025 or 2026." He goes on to say: "As part of our capability building, we hired 23,000 new employees last year, primarily engineers and manufacturing employees. And this year, we plan to add another 10,000 with that very same focus. Similarly, we’re starting to bring up spending on research and development and capital expenditures. In 2023, we plan to increase these investments by more than 10 percent to more than $4.5 billion." This investor guidance comes a week after Boeing on 13 April forecast "lower near-term 737 Max deliveries" as the airframer and the US Federal Aviation Administration resolve a manufacturing quality issue that "will likely affect a significant number of undelivered 737 Max airplanes, both in production and in storage". Spirit AeroSystems, the fuselage supplier for Max aircraft, told Cirium on 13 April that it notified Boeing after identifying "a quality issue on the aft fuselage section of certain models of the 737 fuselage that Spirit builds". The FAA has allowed in-service Max jets to continue flying, and Spirit states the non-standard manufacturing process used "is not an immediate safety of flight issue". Boeing states that this "non-standard manufacturing process" was used by Spirit "during the installation of two fittings in the aft fuselage section of certain 737-7, 737-8, 737-8-200 and P-8 model airplanes". The airframer notified the FAA of the issue and forecasts lower Max deliveries because it raises "the potential for a non-conformance to required specifications". Speaking to shareholders, Calhoun says "this delivery delay removes approximately 9,000 seats from our customers’ summer schedules and we apologise to all of them". "Unaffected airplanes will continue to deliver," he says, adding that there is "an airplane-by-airplane evaluation" to determine which need reworking. The airframer based in Arlington, Virginia, accelerated its rate of deliveries during 2022 from the previous year to both reduce its Max inventory and prepare for faster jet production. Shipments to China have been a wild card for Boeing's long-term guidance. Despite a number of Max jets resuming flying within China, the Civil Aviation Administration of China has made no formal notification about when shipments of new jets will resume, while Calhoun says "we’ve recently seen encouraging progress" with the regulator. "As of this month, all Max operators in China have returned to flying their airplanes in service, and 45 of the 95 Max airplanes in China are now in service," Calhoun says. China Southern was the first Chinese carrier to return Max jets to service in January and expects to take delivery of 103 new 737s by 2025. China Eastern is scheduled to receive eight 737s through 2024, of which six already appear to be built. It is unclear if orders for an additional 11 737s will be cancelled or postponed for its subsidiary Shanghai Airlines. Air China has removed all of its 737 deliveries for the next three years. Boeing is seeking interested parties for those 20 737s it built for Air China, along with two more aircraft in production.

Airline commitment to using sustainable aviation fuel in future represents a significant step in the sector's efforts to become carbon neutral by 2050, in the view of IATA director general Willie Walsh. During a panel discussion at the Sustainable Skies World Summit at Farnborough in the UK on 17 April, Walsh recalled a previous IATA target in 2009 to halve commercial aviation carbon-dioxide emissions by 2050, noting that the airline body had not provided a plan as to how the savings would be achieved. It was a "commitment in the dark", he says, adding that IATA subsequently decided to establish an emission-reduction roadmap when it reviewed its sustainability strategy and adopted the net-zero target by 2050, along with other sectors. Walsh emphasises that IATA's plan, which includes a target to source 10% of airlines' fuel consumption from SAF by 2030, represents one rather than "the" sustainability roadmap, indicating that initiatives will evolve as the sector moves toward net zero. But he highlights the importance SAF plays in the roadmap and commitment by airlines to using it despite its higher price versus fossil-based kerosene. "We wanted to send a sign that anybody who is concerned about demand for SAF should now relax, because we were clearly saying [that] the industry is now giving you the loudest demand signal that anybody has [given] that we see sustainable aviation as the single most important contribution to net zero." IATA estimates that 65% of aviation's CO2 emission reduction by 2050 will be achieved through SAF. But Walsh adds that it is "disappointing that we have not seen greater commitment to production. We have seen very strong commitment to demand. But that has not been matched, in the main, by an equal commitment to production." The IATA executive believes this is partly a result of a lack of visibility about policies governing SAF production and support for its development. He cites the US government's 2022 Inflation Reduction Act and clean-energy tax credits included in that bill as significant steps to spur SAF production and employment. IAG chief executive Luis Gallego, who also participated in the panel, called for more investment in SAF production and policies to encourage establishment of new facilities. He references commitments made in the UK to have five SAF plants under construction by 2025, but says the country will require 14 facilities to meet the target of using 10% SAF by 2030. There is a "big gap to close", he adds. Jimmy Samartzis, chief executive of US-based sustainable fuel technology company LanzaJet – another panellist – also suggests that while steps have been made toward wider SAF use, meeting the 10% target remains a "tall order". He highlights regulatory differences between the USA and the EU and UK which, in his view, limit SAF development. While first-grade ethanol can be used to power aircraft in the USA, its use is restricted for aviation in the EU and UK, he observes. Samartzis counts ethanol as one of three viable ways of producing SAF today – the other two being hydro-processed esters and fatty acids and solid municipal waste converted via Fischer-Tropsch processing. He argues governments should not "prematurely decide" which SAFs can be used for commercial aviation and which can't, and instead let the market determine the most viable solutions. "Looking for perfection" in SAF production and deployment, he suggests, could hold-up progress in reducing aviation emissions. "Let's get there as fast we can," he says. "There is technology available today that we should be focussing on deploying as quicky as we can rather than focussing on technology that should be available in 15 years' time." However, Samartzis does see a role for government to provide funding for SAF developers that may not be able to access significant funding from private capital market. Governments can serve as an "extremely valuable" source of financing, he says.