29 November 2022: AZEA – the Alliance for Zero Emission Aviation held its first General Assembly, hosted by EUROCONTROL, in Brussels on 14 November.

AZEA shares the ambition of Destination 2050 and the Toulouse declaration, to prepare Europe for hydrogen and electric flight and build an EU aeronautics industry committed to delivering green aircraft. AZEA focusses on an energy shift towards electric and hydrogen propulsion. Being an open platform for private and public stakeholders preparing the aviation ecosystem for the earliest possible entry into commercial service of hydrogen and electric aircraft, the role of AZEA is to facilitate co-operation between different actors that need to be involved to turn prototypes into commercial successes. AZEA's focus being disruptive aircraft configuration, its work will not include SAF.

The core tasks of AZEA are in three phases:

1. The Analyse phase, will identify barriers, define requirements and asses actions required to overcome the barriers.
2. The Connection phase has the objective to work for partnerships, investments and synergies, and create momentum.
3. The Recommendation phase consists of the establishment of a roadmap based on a roll-out scenario, recommendations and objectives to address investments and barriers such as legislation, standardisation etc. This phase will also lead to defined priorities and milestones and support coordinated actions.

The AZEA governance consists of the Steering Committee, chaired by the European Commission (DG DEFIS) and composed of members from different organisations of stakeholders, and the General Assembly.

Launched in June this year at ILA Air Show by Commissioner Breton, AZEA has more than 90 members from 23 countries and a broad representation of stakeholders. According to the plan, there are six working groups of experts starting their analysis work by January 2023. The first deliverables from the workgroups are expected to be published at the Paris Air Show in June 2023.

The six working groups are interconnected but will concentrate on different areas of the transformative process. Their tasks were presented during the meeting following the General Assembly:

W.G 1   Rollout scenarios

W.G 2   Green electricity and hydrogen supply

W.G 3   Airports (infrastructure and operations)

W.G 4   Aviation regulation (infrastructure and operations)

W.G. 5  Integration of electric and hydrogen aircraft into European network

W.G 6   Incentive mechanisms 

There is a need for competence and expertise; applications for the working groups are to be made by an online tool and the participants are to be nominated by EC, on basis of activities and expertise in relation to the working groups’ area of work by end November.

https://ec.europa.eu/eusurvey/runner/AZEA-Working-Groups [1]