Belgian Firm Revolutionizes Aircraft Recycling at Charleroi Airport

While places with a lot of space, like the Mojave Desert in Arizona, but also the airports of Teruel (Spain), Tarbes (France) or sites in Africa, have specialized in the storage of old decommissioned aircraft, Sabena Engineering, the aeronautical maintenance branch of the Orizio group, is betting on the dismantling of these aircraft. There is a place, near Charleroi airport, to recycle aircraft, while making money, the company estimates. "Some aircraft parts now have an inestimable value," analyzes Stéphane Burton, CEO of the Belgian aeronautical group Orizio.

Sabena Engineering prefers to go and get these parts and enhance them, rather than turning the decommissioned aircraft into a large pile of scrap metal. "If you do it right, everything has value on an abandoned plane, even the seats," explains the Belgian media La Libre. The company will carry out what is called in aviation, cannibalization: being able to reuse a maximum of parts on another aircraft, after proper certification. "We avoid a very polluting cycle: that of the extraction of ores necessary for the manufacture of these parts," insists Stéphane Burton. Some elements, such as hydraulic pumps, can be used in other sectors, such as the automotive industry."

Sabena Engineering aims to dismantle 30 to 50 aircraft per year, "while 700 to 1,000 units are withdrawn from the global fleet each year". The activities of the Carolo site will be launched by 2030. In total, 50 million euros, including 18 million at the expense of the Walloon Region (16 million in development aid and 2 million related to the training component), will be invested in the overall project. In case of success, the company "could develop this activity in Morocco and California, right next to the current largest aircraft cemeteries".

In Morocco, the National Airports Office (ONDA) had launched an international call for tenders, open between April 15 and June 8, 2021, for the selection of a company that would ensure, as part of a DBFOT contract, the design, construction, financing and operation of a storage, dismantling and recycling center for aircraft and aircraft parts. But the project is at a standstill. A blockage linked to the availability of land.