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EASA Regulation

Latest update 06 March 2015

The European Commission and the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) are the two main bodies responsible for EU technical legislation and implementation material related to the regulation of civil aviation safety, maintenance, operational and environmental activities.

ERA works closely with EASA across a number of detailed work areas and activities as well holding high level meeting with senior EASA staff members.

EASA is soon to publish their official Opinion of the review of their own basic regulation, that will then involve consultation and endorsement by the European Commission and Parliament before amended regulation is introduced (expected by the end of 2015).

EASA’s Management Board of member states has requested EASA, Eurocontrol and ECAC to each report their views of potential overlaps in the EU regulatory system.

The EASA Opinion in response to A-NPA 2014-12 is to be published in March (based on over 6000 comments from 230 organisations, of which 70% came from industry) the expected content is to include:

  • Enable Transfer/delegation of tasks between NAAs or between NAA and EASA for those who are lacking necessary resources.
  • To establish a pool of inspectors at EU level, to be shared between NAAs as needed.
  • Funding to remain via Fees and Charges and EC-subsidy at similar levels to the current system but additional responsibilities for ATM oversight should be funded via a share of existing route-charges. Further review of the distribution of Fees & Charges is foreseen.
  • European Aviation Safety Plan (EASp) to be given legal status and be used to drive evidence-based approach across the EASA system and link to State Safety Plans (SSPs).
  • International – gain more recognition of EASA in ICAO and strengthen international promotion of EU rules/standards as well as providing more international support for EU industry.
  • Allow state services (e.g. search and rescue, firefighting, etc. but not military) to opt-in to oversight by EASA on a voluntary basis.
  • Reinforce EASA role in REACH process.
  • To create a legal basis for a European Aviation Environmental Plan (EAEp: part of EASp or separate document) to focus on environmental performance and promote its visibility at EU level. However this will remain consistent with ICAO environmental rules and standards.
  • Security – not changing anything at state level but to increase EASA’s support to the EC’s responsibilities, e.g. security inspections.


Additional recent EASA actions of interest to ERA members include:

Cabin Air Quality – EASA signed a contract with the Fraunhofer Institute and a consortium of mostly German airlines to launch research activity to gather air chemical concentration data from flights this year.

Aircraft Tracking – EC proposal is reported as almost ready to publish and will follow ICAO position, expect to be adopted by EASA Committee in June/July, with additional consultation planned with Industry’s Safety Standards Consultative Committee and the states Regulatory Advisory Group.

Conflict Zones – EASA working with DG-HOME on an alerting system. Will be trialed first on areas subject to recent Safety Information Bulletins (SIBs) issued.

Rulemaking Process – change in EASA strategy towards rulemaking – new rules are to be the last resort, not first resort for addressing safety issues. Other solutions such as industry standards and training should be used where possible and any new rules should be performance based rather than prescriptive. Additionally, the Agency’s Executive Director sees  a need to accelerate the rulemaking progress and use “more targeted” consultations.

For questions or further information contact policy.technical@eraa.org