Debunking ‘sustainable’ air travel
At Possible, we’re all about optimism - always finding positive and innovative ways to bring about the fairer, greener society we know is possible.
But while hope is essential in any social movement, it’s important not to let positivity blind us from reality - otherwise it will get in the way of meaningful action on climate change.
Our friends at Stay Grounded have some excellent resources that dive into the detail debunking sustainable aviation. But here is a quick overview of three common myths around the availability of sustainable air travel, why we call relying on technology alone ‘false solutions’, and what you can do to take meaningful action on air travel.
1: “Green” jet fuel and electric planes?
There’s a lot of hopeful chat about using lower carbon power supply for aeroplanes. However, this is unfortunately not viable (and won’t be for a long time). While it’s technically possible to make alternative fuels from waste or biomass, there won’t be anywhere near enough of them to cover more than a tiny fraction of demand for jet fuel.
Synthetic fuels made from captured carbon and green hydrogen will need a huge amount of energy, and be very expensive. If the industry were to try to scale up these fuels to cover the size of increase it wants, using such huge amounts of crops and/or renewable energy for something that such a small fraction of the human population will benefit from would cause serious problems.
For electric planes, an issue is that the size and quantity of batteries needed would simply be too heavy to fly anything except a very small aircraft travelling a short distance - and for hydrogen planes, the greater storage space needed to hold the fuel is a similar barrier.
2: Airlines are cleaning up their work - they have net zero targets
Last year Possible teamed up with researchers at Green Gumption to review the climate targets which the international aviation industry set itself since the year 2000. Astonishingly, we found that all but one of their targets has either been missed, abandoned or just forgotten about - and those targets were far too small to actually get emissions down enough, even if they had been met. How can we expect this industry to deliver on their latest promises when they never met any of their previous targets!?
3: Carbon offsetting means you can undo the damage of your flights.
Carbon offsetting is the idea that emissions released from a flight can be balanced out by funding new renewable energy projects or planting trees. It sounds great right? Unfortunately, it just doesn’t work as a climate solution. Firstly, we simply don’t have time to wait around for decades until the trees planted today reach maturity (if they even ever do, in a warming world increasingly at risk of fires). And the rise in temperatures in emissions in the meantime will cause even more damage.* Secondly, we’re seeing carbon offsetting used as a way for airlines to make people feel ok about flying - to trade one vital action for another, when what we need is both: to reduce flying and to invest in tree planting, renewable energy and protecting forests. For a fuller explanation of the pitfalls of carbon offsetting, see this article by my colleague Max, or this explainer video by slow travel vlogger, Sarah Barfield Marks.
What now?
It’s looking pretty bleak right? The good news is, there are things we can do to protect travel without harming the planet.
For short-distance travel, choose trains or coaches.
Europe is blessed with some of the best rail networks in the world, and there are loads of companies and websites dedicated to help you book flight-free adventures.
Get your employer signed up to Climate Perks
To make the choice to travel flight-free that bit easier, we’re asking companies to give their staff additional paid days off work if they get to their holiday destinations by train, coach or ferry. Since launching, Climate Perks has seen more than 65 organisations promise to give their employees at least two travel days. These organisations include the likes of the environmental NGO Friends of the Earth, the ferry service Direct Ferries, and the law firm Bates Wells.
Support the campaign for a Frequent Flyer Levy
At the moment a small minority of frequent travellers are the problem, and yet we all have to pay the price. Instead of putting a flat rate tax on air travel (which would make flying impossible for many of us), we propose introducing a progressive tax through which the more someone flies, the more they pay.