On the occasion of its 10th anniversary, celebrated in Copenhagen recently, Star Alliance endeavored to take some control over the increasingly volatile discussion concerning commercial aviation's impact on the environment, announcing a transport and marketing partnership with leading conservation organizations while acknowledging that more forceful and unified communication is needed to defend the industry's position.

In an address to member airline executives, industry leaders and media assembled in the Danish capital, SAS Group CEO Mats Jansson said the environment is the "single most important question for aviation to deal with right now in order to achieve sustainable growth." While the alliance reaffirmed its support for new airframe and engine technology and its demand for improved infrastructure, the newly announced Biosphere Connections tie-up with UNESCO's Man and the Biosphere Program gives the airline group both the opportunity to play its part in environmental protection and greater legitimacy when calling for more reasonable analysis of aviation's adverse impact.

Under the agreement signed on May 14 that includes the World Conservation Union, World Heritage sites and the Ramsar Convention On Wetlands, Star "will assist field workers ... with transport to relevant meetings, conferences and events" and promote conservation and sustainable use "throughout [its] extensive communications distribution systems," including inflight and Web-based media.

Lufthansa CEO Wolfgang Mayrhuber said he was glad to see the alliance take a proactive role. "I'm very happy, actually, that this discussion is getting so ridiculous in some areas that we now have the one-time chance to grab it and really come down with facts and figures and opportunities that we would like to use in the future," he said.

Reminding listeners that 3 km. of runway can take one around the world but 3 km. of highway "takes you 3 km.," Mayrhuber lauded the global airline fleet's improving fuel efficiency and said, "It's even more important that those who steer this discussion, not only the media but those who want to be elected next year, [to] ask what is reasonable to be done but also ask themselves, 'Why are they polluting the air with legal constraints?'."

Star CEO Jaan Albrecht joined the call for improved ATC and ground infrastructure, liberalization and an end to "additional taxes and fees," insisting that commercial aviation "is doing far more than others ... to strive for environmental sustainability," and that all are challenged "to put the intense efforts of the whole aviation industry into the right perspective compared to the overall size of the matter."