Denmark is accelerating its plans to begin producing enough sustainable aviation fuel to power all of its domestic flights and some international services by 2027, three years ahead of its original ambition. The Scandinavian country announced at the start of the year that it planned to introduce SAF on domestic flights by 2025 and power all domestic flights using the fuel-type by 2030, as part of its Green Fuels For Denmark initiative. It now says that it will bring forward 100MW of electrolysis capacity from 2027 to 2025, which could see it produce 50,000 tonnes of fuels for heavy transport in 2025, rising to the equivalent of the country's entire domestic requirements by 2027. "The Danish Prime Minister's recent announcement of the ambition to accelerate the green transformation of aviation has directly made us in the partnership look for a way to enable the production of green jet fuel as early as 2025," states Mads Nipper, chief executive of Danish power company Orsted, which is part of the initiative. "It will be a technological challenge that we in Green Fuels for Denmark are ready to answer, so that we can secure Denmark's position as a green leader in the coming decades and push for a green breakthrough for the global transformation of the aviation industry," he adds. In the initial vision for Green Fuels for Denmark, the plan was to commission an electrolysis plant with a capacity of around 10MW in 2023 rising to 250MW in 2027 and 1,300MW by 2030. Electrolysis of 250MW would be able to supply enough jet fuel to cover "significantly more" than the projected Danish domestic consumption of jet fuel and contribute to the needs of international aviation. Green Fuels for Denmark's final phase of 1,300 MW will be able to supply green fuels, primarily jet fuel, that can replace around 30% of the total fuel consumption at Copenhagen Airport. The project is led by a partnership consisting of energy company Orsted, SAS, Copenhagen Airports, and logistics firms Maersk, DFDS and DSV.

South Korean low-cost carrier T’way Air is preparing to introduce its first Airbus A330-300 aircraft on 24 February. The first aircraft is undergoing a test flight locally after finishing work at HAECO Xiamen in China, it says in a statement. T’way Air plans to introduce a total of three A330-300 aircraft between within the first half of the year. The airline says the exterior of the aircraft has been painted, and a total of 347 seats, including business class and economy class, have been installed. The first A330-300 will initially be operated on the Gimpo-Jeju route from the end of March, and thereafter, used for cargo flights on mid- to long-distance routes such as Singapore and Sydney, in line with the plan to resume international flights. The second aircraft, scheduled to be introduced in March, is also undergoing aircraft maintenance, seat replacement and painting.

German anti-trust regulator Bundeskartellamt has made a preliminary ruling that leisure carrier Condor is entitled under competition law to continue its feeder flight arrangement with Lufthansa Group, which the latter is attempting to terminate.
In an 8 February statement, the Bundeskartellamt says its preliminary assessment is that Condor should be allowed to continue accessing flights operated by Lufthansa to transport passengers onto its long-haul network. Lufthansa said in December 2020 that its decision to terminate the long-standing feeder flight agreement with Condor was part of a wider plan to prioritise the use of its own capacity. In January 2021, Condor – a former Lufthansa subsidiary – filed a complaint with the Bundeskartellamt, in which it alleged that Lufthansa was exploiting its "monopoly position" in seeking to terminate the arrangement. The anti-trust authority's investigation prompted Lufthansa to delay terminating the agreement with Condor from the originally planned date of 1 June 2021 until 10 May 2022. Based on its investigations, the Bundeskartellamt said on 8 February that Condor was entitled under competition law to continue accessing the Lufthansa-operated feeder flights beyond 10 May. "Our preliminary assessment is that the Lufthansa Group has a dominant position on the feeder flights market which mainly connects German airports to Condor's long-haul network. No other carrier operates more than just a few individual feeder flights to the major German hubs Frankfurt, Munich and Dusseldorf," states Bundeskartellamt president Andreas Mundt. "Lufthansa is, therefore, subject to abuse control under competition law and has to comply with special obligations." He adds that the regulator has concerns regarding "the admissibility of the termination of [Lufthansa's] co-operation with Condor insofar as this could lead to an unfair impediment to competition on the downstream markets for long-haul flights". The agreement covers almost 90 transfer connections, on which the anti-trust regulator has asserted that loss of access for Condor would have "severe economic consequences both for the company and for competition". The Bundeskartellamt has also determined that the agreements between Lufthansa and Condor "contain further illegal impediments to competition", including what it says include limited access to booking classes, discriminatory access to seat capacities on feeder flights and limited pricing options for Condor. Lufthansa and Condor will now have an opportunity to comment on the preliminary ruling. Lufthansa Group confirms that it has received the Bundeskartellamt's draft decision, and says it will reply to the regulator and "take a comprehensive position". It declines to provide further comment.