The End of Flying?
Well, maybe not. Let’s examine the case:
In 2018, flying planes released over 890,000,000,000 kg of CO2
That’s a very large burden on the Earth’s atmosphere. In fact, the IPCC has estimated that aviation is responsible for around 3.5 – 5 percent of anthropogenic climate change.
Furthermore, from David Suzuki:
“When jet fuel is burned, the carbon in the fuel is released and bonds with oxygen ( O2 ) in the air to form carbon dioxide ( CO2 ). Burning jet fuel also releases water vapour, nitrous oxides, sulphate, and soot.
“A special characteristic of aircraft emissions is that most of them are produced at cruising altitudes high in the atmosphere. Scientific studies have shown that these high-altitude emissions have a more harmful climate impact because they trigger a series of chemical reactions and atmospheric effects that have a net warming effect. The IPCC, for example, has estimated that the climate impact of aircraft is two to four times greater than the effect of their carbon dioxide emissions alone.”
Therefore it it clear that the airline industry is rather brutal in its contribution to pollution of our atmosphere, and therefore its adverse effects our environment and climate change prognosis.
However, most of us love to fly to visit new places, and save up to go on vacation every year or two, to learn about other cultures or spend a week at a warm, tropical destination.
Therefore, the thought of putting an end to long-haul jet travel is rather depressing.
Now, most scientists would agree that the Earth’s atmosphere and ecosystems CAN absorb some amount of pollution and greenhouse gases — aquatic and land based plants do consume CO2 after all.
So, what if we made the collective decision to accelerate the conversion of our ground and water-based transportation systems (ie. the remaining 95+% of our fossil fuel pollution) to clean, sustainable technologies — and ‘save’ our pollution for modes like jet travel that absolutely require it ? [Especially if we also moved our short-haul aircraft (ie. < 1000 miles / 1,500 km) to electric propulsion, further reducing the industry output.]
After all, as engineers at Boeing and Airbus will correctly claim: It will be a long time before we have the technology to provide battery- or hydrogen-powered long-haul, wide-body jets that can take us from New York to London in 7 hours.
So, if you agree with this approach, here’s the plan going forward:
- Cars, motorcycles, personal pleasure craft ==> Battery Electric.
- Lawnmowers, hedge trimmers, blowers ==> Battery Electric.
- Short- and Long-haul Trucks & Tractor-trailers ==> Battery Electric.
- Trains, shuttles, trams, buses ==> Electric lines, rails & Battery Electric.
- Cargo vessels, cruise ships, large yachts, tugs ==> BioFuels.
- Short-haul / regional aircraft ==> JET A-1 Kerosene & BioFuel Equivalents & Battery Electric.
- Medium- and Long-haul Widebody Jets ==> JET A-1 Kerosene & BioFuel Equivalents
This is too important to not get right. So, let’s all pull together to move these industries a little bit faster toward clean and green propulsion.
