Air Travel And Climate Change
Concern over aircrafts' carbon footprint
Recently, the tourism industry has drawn the attention of world environment leaders regarding tourism and climate change. This has been echoed in aviation, a part of the tourism industry. Aviation experts around the world believe there is just one way to reduce aircraft's carbon footprint: stop flying. It has been logical that, people cannot live without luxurious aviation and at the same time the industry is booming, swelling greenhouse gases just as the climate-change urgency starts to crunch. Time is due, it has to be balanced right back. Climate experts, aircraft engineers and scientists around the world are straight away judging that technology, taxation, and rationing -- or a combination of all three -- is obligatory to discontinue aircraft from overbalancing the climate-change equation. The statistics look threatening. Aviation currently puts in about 3 percent of global carbon emissions, but air travel is mounting at some 5 percent a year, meaning numbers of air passenger kilometers will triple by 2030. Boeing guesstimates that aircraft numbers will double to more than 30,000 in little more than a decade. Added to this is the complication that aircraft does not just give off carbon dioxide but nitrous oxide, considered to have at least doubled the impact of CO2, and condensation trails, which also may contribute to global warming. Aircraft manufacturers are all the time improving design of bodywork and engines, deriving greater fuel efficiency that reduces carbon emissions. A British study group has recently started to look at a range of technological and other factors -- including aircraft design, sustainable fuels, and open rotor-propelled aircraft -- that reduce fuel burn, to assess how they could alleviate aircraft pollution. Boeing last month unveiled the 787 Dreamliner, which it says will use 20 percent less fuel than similar-sized aircraft. The UN International Panel on Climate Change also states that constant improvements have made planes 70 percent more efficient than they were 40 years ago. Another 40-50 percent improvement can be expected over the next 30 years. The problem, climate experts think, is that current projections indicate that air travel is set to grow 400 percent in the same time period. Scientists are unconvinced, though, of the potential for running jets on biofuels. Then there is the area of land required to produce fuel in sufficient volume. Already, environmentalists are concerned at the way rainforest is being destroyed to make way for palm oil, a biofuel crop. Given the inadequate prospects for a technological solution, a growing body of opinion is arguing for efforts to manage demand for air travel. What matters is the next 10 to 15 years, and technology can do very little in that time frame. The principal issue becomes how to reduce the rate of growth of air travel. Experts have pointed to several options. Europe is graphing to include aviation in its emissions-trading plan starting in 2011. The hope is to place an instance to the rest of the world, chiefly China and India, where aviation growth is rolling on, that concerted efforts can make a difference. Airlines will get a limited number of CO2 permits that can be traded; top polluters will have to buy additional permits, hurting their bottom line. The idea is to give airlines motivation to operate cleaner aircraft; higher ticket prices may take place as well, reining in demand. But experts have noted that caps will be set fairly high, weakening the imperative; ticket prices are anticipated to rise by only a couple of euros, if that. Consumer behaviour may thus be little affected. It can be said that without a radical price change, it will be impossible to change the mind-set of a generation that thinks little of hopping $20 flights for weekend pursuits. Some have lobbied for cigarette-style health warnings on ads for air travel and long-distance holidays, but it has been argued that the only way to transform behaviour is to hit the wallet. But it is not just about leisure travel. Business travel makes up, by some estimates, about 40-50 percent of all air travel. One element of the British Omega project is a study that looks at how business can reduce its aviation carbon footprint. It involves persuading businesses to gauge the carbon they consume, choose flights that are not just the lowest cost but are least environmentally damaging, all should use rail where possible, and make greater use of videoconferencing and webcast solutions. All should aim at coming up with a range of practical tools that will help companies start managing their carbon consumption. One company in UK, Price Water house Coopers has introduced recently an internal 'carbon budget' whereby its 1,000 top travelers must reduce their CO2 footprint by 20 percent. To be sure, some aviation specialists believe that personal carbon budgets -- rationing -- may be the only way out. It is too late for voluntary mechanisms in the aviation industry. Carbon allowances are the only fair way to deal with this. Technology, taxation, and rationing are all being justified as feasible solutions. Mohammad Shahidul Islam is faculty, National Hotel and Tourism Training Institute, Bangladesh Parjatan Corporation.
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