On June 28, the second day of the World Economic Forum"s 14th Annual Meeting of the Champions, also known as the "Summer Davos", Xu Gang, CEO of Airbus China, shared his views on the energy transition.

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"The aviation industry is in a period of transformation, which will revolve around digitalization and green development," Xu said in an interview with the National Business Daily. He is very optimistic about the prospects of China"s aviation industry in the sustainable energy market.

At the same time, Xu Gang also expressed optimism about China"s aviation market.

The sustainable aviation fuel market in China has huge potential

It is worth noting that on June 27, the Summer Davos Forum released the "2023 Top Ten Emerging Technologies Report", which lists the top ten technologies with the greatest potential to have a positive impact on the world, including sustainable aviation fuel.

"The aviation industry has set the goal of net-zero emissions by 2050," Xu told NBD. "To achieve this goal globally, an important means is the large-scale use of sustainable bio-jet fuel to replace traditional fossil jet fuel."

In his view, China has four important advantages in the development of sustainable bio-jet fuel. "One is in terms of raw materials, whether it is second-hand gutter oil, biomass, or green electricity or green hydrogen, China has a good advantage in resources and costs."

"Second, China"s industrial manufacturing capacity is the strongest in the world." "Third, China will be a huge market for sustainable aviation fuel in the future, so it has market advantages. The fourth most important advantage is that once our country has the policy to support and guide the development of sustainable biofuels, the implementation of the policy will also have a very clear advantage because we are very strong in implementation."

"In this regard, we have many successful cases, such as in batteries, solar panels, wind power and other industries. All of these cases make us believe that once the Chinese government has a very clear policy direction, then China will be a very good laboratory for the large-scale production of sustainable aviation fuel." Xu Gang said.

Half of Asian market growth will be in China in the coming 20 years

On April 6, Airbus signed a new cooperation agreement with its Chinese aviation partners, including the bulk purchase of 160 Airbus civil aircraft, opening a new chapter in the cooperation between Airbus and the Chinese aviation industry.

Regarding the development of China"s aviation market, Xu Gang told NBD, "There is no doubt that China"s aviation market is very attractive, currently accounting for 20% of the global aviation market. "We expect that 50% of the global growth in the next 20 years will be in Asia. In Asia, and China accounts for half of growth in Asia."

In addition, Xu Gang also talked about China"s development of the entire life cycle industry chain of aircraft. Earlier, Airbus, TARMAC Aerosave and Chengdu joined forces to establish China"s first joint venture for aircraft lifecycle service projects.

"There are more than 2,000 Airbus aircraft in China, accounting for more than 50% of China"s fleet. With the development of our fleet, we see full life cycle projects as a requirement for many customers in the future." Xu Gang told NBD, "When the aircraft reaches a certain life period, it is necessary to transform passenger aircraft into cargo aircraft." In the Chinese freighter market, many companies are very interested in the cargo conversion program."

"When the aircraft comes to the end of its life, there are actually a lot of high-value structural parts on it. The reuse of these devices can help optimize operating costs. During the dismantling process, we have a special set of technologies that enable more than 90% of the weight of the aircraft to be safely reused, which is one of the highest standards in the world. In this way, we want to set a good benchmark in the green reuse of aircraft." Xu Gang added.