GERMANY Trends and Developments Contributed by: Richard Prechtel and Matthias Reuleaux, activelaw Offenhausen.Wolter PartmbB
person has a nexus to the US. The US sanctions are administered by the authorities OFAC (Office of For - eign Asset Control) and BIS (Bureau of Industry and Security). There are scenarios where the operation of US manufactured aircraft or aircraft with US manu - factured components might cause a breach of US sanctions against Russia; and, obviously, other US sanctions targeting the aviation industry (eg, Cuba, Iran) must also be complied with. In sum, any flight operations involving a country exposed to US sanc - tions must also be analysed by non-US persons to assess whether such operation falls within the scope Like many other industries, the aviation industry has implemented measures to reduce levels of CO₂ emis - sions in order to address the environmental impact of international aviation. The ICAO (International Civil Aviation Organisation) developed the so-called CORI - SA regime (Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme), activated in 2021. The EU released the European Trad - ing Scheme (already in 2012), supplemented by the European Green Deal with targets for the EU territory to be climate-neutral by 2050. of a specific sanction. Sustainable Aviation Industry experts analysed utilisation data of passen - ger and cargo flights and used this as the basis for estimated CO₂ emissions. The data reveals that 2024 gross emissions were 1% higher than in the baseline year of 2019 (applied in the CORSIA regime) – despite the fact that the global fleet has far more modern and fuel-efficient aircraft than in 2019. Predictions for 2025 suggest that passenger traffic will grow by 7–8% over 2024, with gross emissions increasing around 6%. The availability of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) will be too small to have a relevant impact on this increase, with IATA estimating around 0.3% SAF usage in 2024, perhaps growing to 0.5–1.0% in 2025. Thus, the diver - gence between actual net CO₂ emissions and the Net Zero pathways will widen further.
Experts demand that the aviation industry must inevi - tably adopt broader tools in order to achieve sustaina - bility goals: regulatory shifts, SAF and carbon removal supply chains, new technologies and infrastructure needs should become central in financial terms for the airline and aircraft-lessor industry. The request is that financing terms (and maybe also leasing terms and conditions) be enhanced and extended by KPIs linked to CO₂ emission reductions and other sustainability targets – alongside traditional metrics like creditwor - thiness and asset quality. It is yet to be seen whether these parameters become standard figures. Multiple aircraft loan facilities were concluded that provided for a margin-concept offering lower margins as a reward for meeting certain pre-defined sustainability goals. In 2025, industry participants in Germany will need to monitor how the perceived risk of failing to meet sustainability targets (under the various regimes) may impact aircraft financing and leasing terms.
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