Featured Initiative
FlyForward
A regional coalition initiative to retrain Santa Noeta Regional Airport’s ground and maintenance workforce for zero-emission infrastructure — one of the first programs of its kind in the state.
What FlyForward Is
FlyForward is a zero-emission retraining initiative anchored at Santa Noeta Regional Airport (STQ). Its goal is to retrain the airport’s roughly 340-person ground and maintenance workforce for the clean-energy systems the airport is scheduled to begin operating in 2028 — and to do it in a way that serves as a working model for the region’s broader transition from fossil-fuel infrastructure to clean energy.
The idea, proposed by a regional coalition in 2018, was straightforward: the airport employs people from every corner of the region, it faces federally mandated modernization regardless, and it is already there. Rather than build a workforce program in the abstract, build it around an institution that already employs local people and is already required to change.
Why It Matters Here
Santa Noeta spent thirty years being described in planning documents as a community in need of revitalization. Then a 2011 survey found a significant geothermal and biofuel prospect beneath Lake Noeta, and for the first time in decades the valley was something people wanted access to again. That access runs through the communities who never left — the Alta Springs Nation’s senior water rights, the Cupan Rock Tribe’s transit corridors, the Shoreline Band’s contested geothermal claim. FlyForward is the part of that larger story that is about people: making sure the workers who keep the region running are equipped for the work that’s coming, on terms that don’t repeat the region’s history of extraction and abandonment.
The Consortium’s Role
The Santa Noeta Consortium is the human-infrastructure partner for FlyForward. Its three divisions do the work the initiative depends on: Santa Noeta Research establishes what the workforce actually needs and whether the training transfers; Santa Noeta Design & Performance Improvement builds the curriculum and the on-the-job support; and Santa Noeta Innovations develops the field technology that makes it scalable. The work is done with the region’s community partners, not on them.