As the 737 EcoDemonstrator program moved into a new phase in mid-September, Aviation Week was invited to Boeing's remote facility here to witness a typical flight test.

U.S. election becomes right-to-work battlefield

While they may disagree on energy policy, crucially for the aviation industry President Barack Obama and Republican rival Mitt Romney do agree that a national program designed to expand the production of biofuels should continue. As the Pentagon and airlines try to bridge the gap between the technical feasibility and commercial availability of advanced biofuels as drop-in replacements for fossil fuels, government support for scaling up both feedstock and fuel production is proving critical—and controversial.

Low-fare carriers in Asia are mostly to thank for a billion-dollar increase in the profits forecast for airlines in 2012 by the International Air Transport Association ( IATA). But profits will still be more than 50% down from last year and the improvement expected next year will not bring airlines back to the healthier levels of 2011 or 2010.

There are few silver linings in a situation where two related engine types fail within weeks of each other.

President Barack Obama's widely panned debate included criticism for his lack of interest and intensity. The lackluster performance extended to the few areas in which aerospace and defense entered the discussion, as Obama opted to ignore messages that resonate with Americans in favor of dusting off an old battle that never took off. And his attacks on Mitt Romney's proposal to spend 4% of GDP on defense during a time of tight budgets went nowhere.

A new mid-year report from Aviation Week's Top-Performing Companies (TPC) study reveals that the aerospace and defense (A&D) industry remains resilient, even as potentially deep cuts to Pentagon spending draw closer. Boeing held on to its top ranking of 10 publicly traded contractors with revenues of more than $20 billion, raising its TPC score two points in the first half of 2012, to 89. And the next three companies, all pure-play defense contractors, also managed to boost their performances, reversing declines in 2011.

It may be one of the most isolated, loneliest flight-test outposts in the Northern Hemisphere, but that is exactly why Boeing prefers to perform flight-testing at the former Glasgow AFB in the northeast corner of Montana.