Business Aviation Is Climbing Fast Despite Opposition

23.10.2023 - 03:33 / forbes.com / prince Harry / Meghan Markle

In Las Vegas, when it comes to conventions, one of the changes that's constant are the badges.

On Thursday, as I walked through the lobby of the Wynn, it was filled with lanyards indicating the wearers were attending the National Business Aviation Association's annual Business and Aviation Conference, known as BACE.

By Friday, the name tags were for something else, from companies selling electronics to medical devices and chemicals.

These conventioneers had no idea that the over 20,000 folks attending BACE, most of whom had just left, play an important role in helping their industries succeed.

However, 10 business aviation groups hope a new campaign launched last week will start correcting some misinformation about private jets.

Per Climbing.Fast, its goal is "setting the record straight on the industry's many societal benefits, including its leadership role in sustainability."

Its website points out, "Business aviation plays an essential role in creating economic opportunity, connecting communities and fostering innovation."

It notes the industry has committed to being carbon neutral by 2050, and it highlights that business aviation is an incubator for sustainability advances such as winglets and composites that ended up being used for those big airplanes, we all jam into.

The group's mission may not be impossible, but it's certainly difficult.

Most of the news items I saw about private jets over the past few days were that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle had been spotted boarding a Dassault Falcon 7X heading to the Caribbean after roll of the drums, speaking at Project Healthy Minds, where, per the Daily Mail, part of the agenda was about how climate change is having an adverse effect on young people.

The connection of private aviation to those conventioneers in Las Vegas from other industries is often missed, sometimes intentionally.

Business aviation supports over 1.2 million U.S. jobs and drives nearly $250 billion into the economy annually.

During BACE, Honda Aircraft Company noted it will spend over $50 million to expand its manufacturing facility in Greensboro, North Carolina, creating 280 new jobs, as it begins product of a new long-range light jet.

Earlier this year, NetJets, the largest operator of private jets in the world, said it would buy as many as 1,500 airplanes from Textron Aviation and another 500 from Embraer, supporting jobs from Wichita, Kansas, to Florida's Space Coast.

On a smaller scale, Memphis-based charter operator AB Jets placed an order for three of Bombardier’s Challenger 3500s, with an option for a fourth. The deal supports jobs in facilities across Mexico, the United States and Canada.

Many of the flights by private jets – and turboprops – that detractors pan are, in