United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon praised the environmental contributions of the Solar Impulse project and its founders earlier this week, during his tour of the pioneering solar-powered aircraft in its temporary hangar at JFK airport in New York.
The UNSG stressed the importance of innovation as governments strive towards the climate change targets under the Paris Agreement and Agenda 2030, and he highlighted the UN"™s participation in the landmark solar flight through the assistance being provided by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).
"ICAO has been an important Institutional Partner to the Solar Impulse project, coordinating with States to help to secure fly over authorizations, take-off and landing permits, and certifications to facilitate this remarkable aircraft"™s round the world journey," the Secretary General remarked.
ICAO"™s Solar Impulse partnership is directly in line with its current Strategic Objective to reduce greenhouse gas and other emissions from international civil aviation activity, using a multi-faceted approach.
The UN agency"™s assistance also supports its mandate to develop air navigation techniques and encourage the arts of aircraft design and operation for peaceful purposes.
"The Solar Impulse initiative illustrates aviation"™s profound commitment to technological research and development, and why modern passenger aircraft are some 80 percent more fuel efficient than the first commercial jets," declared Dr. Olumuyiwa Benard Aliu, President of ICAO Council. "Technological advances are a key aspect of the basket of measures through which ICAO and its States have been mitigating greenhouse gas emissions from international flights, and in addition to streamlined procedures, sustainable alternative fuels, and market-based measures, innovation will continue to be essential to aviation"™s carbon neutral goals for the foreseeable future."
"ICAO is proud to be an Institutional Partner of the Solar Impact project, and to be able to highlight through our assistance how new aircraft technologies not only bring benefits to aviation, but also to overall progress on clean energy," added Dr. Fang Liu, Secretary General of ICAO. "Through these and other partnerships today we are helping States around the world to understand how many aspects of aviation development can contribute to the achievement of the United Nation"™s Agenda 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), 13 of which are directly supported by ICAO"™s current Strategic Objectives for global civil aviation."
Another landmark development for international aviation is expected later this year, during ICAO"™s 39th triennial Assembly at the end of September, when the world will be looking for its 191 Member States to forge agreement on a new market-based measure (MBM) to mitigate international flight emissions "“ a world first for any major industrial sector.
