CANSO welcomes EU agreement on SES2+

Brussells: 6 March 2024 CANSO welcomes the news that the European Parliament and EU Council reached agreement this morning on the SES2 Regulation. We hope that this new legislative framework will help the EU to achieve its ambition of seamless European skies, with increased scalability of air navigation services.

One important way that SES2 can enable this is through the network-wide coordination and cooperation between national entities and operational stakeholders to optimise European airspace, both in terms of capacity and environmental performance.  

The Regulation will also allow air navigation services provides (ANSPs) to decide whether to procure certain services under market conditions, such as for air traffic data or meteorological services.

We note that SES2 will introduce mandatory modulation of en route charges to encourage airspace users to follow fuel-efficient routing, subject to a cost-benefit analysis. We call for this to encompass principle the revenue neutrality for ANSPs, so that they receive the same fees for the provision of their services.

It will be important for ANSPs to be able to balance offering environmental routing with the provision of capacity to airspace users. Looking ahead, they are already investing in capacity through digitalisation and automation, particularly through the EU’s Single European Sky ATM Research Programme (SESAR).

CANSO Director Europe Affairs Tanja Grobotek said: “We congratulate the European Parliament and Council for coming to an agreement on this important legislation. We look forward to receiving and analysing the final text. CANSO stands ready to provide support to the EU institutions when they draw up the implementing legislation to ensure there is a common interpretation, legal certainty and efficient implementation.”