Do you offset? The environmental impact of air travel...

I've looked at offsetting but I'm not entirely convinced, but then I'm hardly an expert. I'd be prepared to invest/donate money into new technologies but haven't done so.

The overall message seems to be - we have to reduce emissions.

I'm probably one of the worst offenders - having been travelling for sixteen months and now my job involves lots of air travel.

The front page of the Independent recently quoted an assessment that said that to meet the UK Governments target's for greenhouse gas emissions (or CO2, not sure which) all other sectors would have to produce zero greenhouse gases in order to sustain current levels of emissions from air travel. That depressed me quite considerably, particularly as I was about to get on a plane to fly around Europe for the week. I guess the problem with such statistics is it makes people think - why bother? I can't help anyway. It's just the papers scaremongering again. Ignore it and it'll go away. Cough. Is that Bird Flu?

Another depressing though - if you look at, for example, California, where Governer Schwarzenegger is setting stiff targets for reducing emissions by 2050 (I think) ... to a level if achieved that will be the same per capita as the current average level in the EU today.

There are some easy things we can do - there a lots of suppliers of 'green electricity' around these days, including in the UK most of the major power companies. I'm sure it's not all kosher but some might well be.

The argument that there is no point developed countries trying not to do something as a small increase in growth in China or India will wipe out any gains anyway is a rather lazy one. It is the developed countries (and our technologies) that have created this mess and that still create a fair bulk of greenhouse gases. The 'West' cannot force the hand of China, and perhaps has only a limited influence on India and the rest of the developing world. What we can do is lead by example - something that might give what pressure we can bring more credence.

The other factor that seems to be coming into play is that private sector companies in many areas are realizing that they can save money and reduce costs by focusing on reducing emissions. It's fairly obvious really - energy costs money. It looks as if it's going to lead to a battle between large and powerful interests - those that benefit from energy extraction and sales against those that are increasingly paying the cost.

I'll still be getting onto planes but I wish someone would make me stop (easy to say, we've just got back ;-) )



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The Independent was keen to highlight that the British Government had very conflicting aims - to reduce greenhouse gasses whilst promoting a massive expansion in air travel.

The exact quote from the Independent was ...

"The Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research calculated last year that if Britain was to meet its target of cutting greenhouse gases by 60 per cent by 2050, and aviation emissions were not reduced, all other emissions - from households, businesses, energy generation and motor transport - would have to go to zero. Flying would be taking up everything that was available."

(http://comment.independent.co.uk/commentators/article1876704.ece)

I guess that's ambiguous - I took it to mean Aviation emissions need to be reduced from todays levels, not from 2050's projected levels. However that contradicts your statistic that aviation only takes up 5.5% of UK emissions.

Whilst attempting to check the facts from the last article I notice the global-warming vs plane travel issue has made the front page of the Independent again today. That's twice in three weeks. Reply to this

Global Warming is a topic we have been hearing more and more about especially in the last few years. The message is we need to act NOW not aim for slowly reducing emissions down the track.

I believe we should be taking major steps in reducing emissions ASAP and even though there has been a major push on it recently, I have always thought about it. I'm a stickler when it comes to turning off lights and electrical devices when they are not needed. Recycling as much as possible. Yet, I am a user. Computers, TV's, Stereos all play a part. My biggest passion, espeically of the last few years has been my travelling, that means using air travel. So here I am screaming that were doing wrong yet hypocritically adding to the problem.

The exact amount of carbon emissions given from air travel is debatable but there is little doubt that if all air travel ceased around the world, there would be a massive difference. I do actually make a conscious decision to travel ecofriendlier. Especially in Europe where I have been travelling most recently, if I have to make a trip somewhere, I will opt for the bus, train or ferry as opposed to taking a seemingly pointless 40 minute flight. Sure buses have their emissions as well but not as much as air travel, thats a fact.

Something Cumberland Sausage said caught my eye. With China being a major offender on the emissions world stage, it is true that we can't force them to reduce emissions but it is worth noting in their defence that they are also one of the leaders in implementing "greener" power. There is a certain city in China (I can't remember which one) that I saw on a documentry that has basically rehauled how and which power is supplied to the city making it on of the most advanced cities in the world for reducing carbon emissions. The country itself has taken bold steps in cutting back on coal use. Officials in Beijing have established 40 "Coal-Free" zones in the city centre and have made plans to construct natural gas pipelines. In 1999 they also ordered all city vehicles to change to clean burning liquefied petroleum gas. We could all learn from China's example, however as for India, well it is true that they need to do something and drastically yet to look at their emissions as opposed the major players like the US, China and the EU, it is not the biggest concern.

As for travelling in the future, I think to reform which fuel planes use or to totally redesign them is the only real long term solution. Sure it would be a massive task but if we as a world want to survive and are serious about taking on global warming, we need to do something like that and now.

Travelling now is a concern as it is getting cheaper and easier for people to trot across the globe. Yet who says a round the world trip needs to use huge amounts fuel. Travelblogs very own Bikepacker is travelling from England to Singapore... on a push bike. Sure so it's not for everyone but maybe that is a way to reduce emission. Maybe not round the world trips but do some smaller trips like the length of Vietnam or around the UK.

There is no way to totally stop carbon emissions but there are steps we can take. In fact if we all (I mean governemnts and citizens alike) take decent steps to reduce emissions we can acutally cut our emission levels to below what our levels in the 70's were. This point is proven in the very thought provoking "An Inconvenient Truth" Al Gore's wake up to the world. See the documentary, read the book or attend the slide show. Anyone who hasn't, do it. Yet after all his statistical nagging he neglects to mention the main theme of this forum, air travel.

I'm afraid to say that I believe that there will be uncomparably major sudden drastic world wide steps taken to stop global warming when we realise it's too late. So at the moment do what we can as individuals, buy energy efficient light globes and turn them off when they are not needed. Buy a car with a smaller more efficient engine or better yet sell your car and take public transport if you live in a big city. Better still, buy a push bike or walk. There are small steps we can all take but dare I suggest on a forum on travelblog... travel less??

Hmmm... nah! But do it responsibly Reply to this

I offset by not driving to work. And I think this is something we can all do. Offsetting your flight across an ocean by donating money to plant trees is a great idea, but the same could be achived if people chose to use more public transportation in their own community.

I can't speak for anyone else here, only my own community. Here in Vancouver during the rush hour 50% of people drive and in those cars there are 137 people in each 100 cars. Not a good ratio.

Leading a life that uses a smaller ecological footprint between holidays should be the first step to offset someone's vacation by airplane.

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And following on from the last post the new winter schedule from my local rail station has resulted in a 34%!c(MISSING)ut in services to one of the two main cities close to where I live, which doesn't seem very joined up thinking. Fortunately its not the city that I work in so I can still rely on public transport for my daily commute and satisfy/fool myself that I have something in the bank to offset future travels.

I'm currently looking into the feasibility of a rtw trip without using any air travel (and www.seat61.com looks like a very useful resource for this). Getting into and out of Kamchatka however is proving difficult. The city of Petropavlovsk is apparently the second most isolated city in the world, with no land transport links with the rest of Russia. Everything I read says that air travel is the only way in and out, though a number of cruise trips do overnight stops at the port there.

I'm still not convinced that "...if all air travel ceased around the world, there would be a massive difference" as posted by The Nomad, with currently just 3%!o(MISSING)f all emissions generated by air travel globally. However, I have been reading that by emitting at altitude the greenhouse effect of emissions from aircraft are multiplied (by a factor of 2.7 according one report I read). From what I can gather though the research into this aspect is still early days.

Finally, especially in light of the Stop Climate Chaos link posted elsewhere, I can't help but provide a link to one of the leading climate change researchers' BBC Green Room article which provides an interesting view on the way the issue is being handled in the public eye. Reply to this

CO2 emissions calculator, which oddly enough indicates that air travel is less polluting than your average car, so there's a solution, build lots more airports and fly everywhere!

And sorry, I seem to be stomping all over this thread - I don't have any axe to grind one way or another. I do wonder how much one can travel and still be environmentally considerate.

I guess voluntary offsetting hasn't really loomed large in people's travel plans, and to be honest I'm still humming and ah'ing about the £148 or so it would take to offset the flights on our recent trip. Reply to this

I may be hated for this, but I like to play devils advocate. Yes I drive a car that gets 30 mpg, I recycle, buy local and conserve electricity. However, I truly believe things must get worse before they can get better. Examples in society are numerous, but basically I believe that sea levels must rise 20 feet and most of the worlds glaciers must melt before any widespread change happens. After I saw Al Gore's movie "An Inconvenient Truth", my first reaction was "How can I reduce my carbon footprint even further?". Then I started to reflect on human civilization, and how the earth is probably at or near the carrying capacity for humans. A quote from a great book by Lester R. Brown:

http://www.earth-policy.org/Books/PB2/index.htm

"If at that point China's per capita resource consumption were the same as in the United States today, then its projected 1.45 billion people would consume the equivalent of two thirds of the current world grain harvest. China's paper consumption would be double the world's current production. There go the world's forests."

If China one day has three cars for every four people, U.S. style, it will have 1.1 billion cars. The whole world today has 800 million cars. To provide the roads, highways, and parking lots to accommodate such a vast fleet, China would have to pave an area equal to the land it now plants in rice. It would need 99 million barrels of oil a day. Yet the world currently produces 84 million barrels per day and may never produce much more."

It seems that as a species we are destined for disaster. Its not just reducing emissions, its fundamental ways we live- consuming forest products, products of petroleum. If the worlds countries want our standard of living in the Western World, we are surely going to have some sort of population check, be it running out of oil, water, excessive pollution or rising sea levels. Its going to take a lot more than CO2 emission graphs, increasing temperatures and enironmentalism to fundamentally change the way human society consumes resources. Its going to take entire cities dissappearing under several feet of sea water for that to happen. In this sense, I dont see anything wrong with carbon emissions: Its speeding up an already too slow process for relying on pollution free sources of energy. But is this even feasible? Is it even remotely possible that 6 Billion people can live sustainably on the earth?

Lets not forget, human population is always increasing- 10 Billion people(almost twice as many as we currently have) by 2050?! Reply to this

Maybe it's an intro to another topic altogether: can Homo sapiens become extinct? I don't think we ever could become extinct. Even during the most massive extinctions on this planet certain animals made it through, mainly the ones who could hunker down for months while the sunshine and then the plants returned, like crocodiles and small rodent like animals. If in 2 weeks a 10 km wide asteroid were to hit the planet- its a guarentee certain priveledged few would make their wait to government bunkers that could sustain them for months, possibly years. When the 'nuclear winter' of impact cleared, invariably these only few hundreds of survivors would be able to repopulate the entire earth. We would be starting over, but we would not be eliminated. And thats the essence of our humanity- our tool use has become so advanced, we can even survive extinction events that would eliminate nearly every other land dwelling creature on the earth. A Scary thought, because a thousand years after repopulation- we would probably begin to detroy the forests and mine the oil and metals all over again... Reply to this