Once the privilege of the few, and now accessible to most, air travel has become, in some people's eyes, an inexcusable abuse of the environment. We know the case against, it is rehearsed in the media almost daily. But before you cancel your business trip, consider some statistics. According to the government-backed Stern Review on climate change, air travel contributes 1.6 per cent of global carbon dioxide emissions. This compares with rail and shipping's combined 1.9 per cent, and road travel's 10.5 per cent.
Given those figures, how has flying found itself as the bogeyman of the green lobby and a whipping boy in the press? Timing is probably the answer – the aviation industry is taking the flak for expanding in a more visible way than other industries when green issues are to the fore. As a consequence, the way airlines conduct themselves now and in the future is under intense scrutiny. Air travel is the fastest-growing source of CO2, but even so, Stern concludes that it will contribute to only five per cent of total global-warming effects by 2050.
Another conscience-salving statistic for frequent flyers is that shipping emissions have grown nearly as fast as those from aircraft in the past 20 years. But super-size container vessels bringing cheap consumer goods from China are not as visible to the general public as aircraft.
Hugh Somerville, a visiting professor at the University of Surrey and former head of environment at BA, believes air travel has been harshly treated in some quarters. "The media has managed to give a slightly – maybe considerably – unfair weighting to this issue. Shipping has, so far, avoided scrutiny, but a cruise holiday is at least as harmful as a long-haul flight if you consider it per passenger. On the other hand, it is quite efficient in terms of moving freight.
I think it is fair to target air travel, but the emphasis is a bit heavily weighted. I saw a survey recently that asked people how big a contributor they thought aviation was to global emissions. The median was 25 per cent, whereas Stern said under two per cent.''
Consequently, airlines have been caught on the back foot and are trying desperately to convince us that they really do have green credentials. Some, such as Easyjet, have gone to extremes, producing fanciful designs of futuristic, fuel-sipping aircraft to convince the public that they care.
Easyjet's chief executive Andy Harrison is frustrated that the green debate is being muddied. He says: "Society needs to weigh up the economic benefits of any activity against its impact. The biggest economic benefit to a country is international trade, and aviation is at the centre of that."
Moreover, no-frills airlines can almost lay claim to being guardians of the environment, as they cram more people on their sparkling new, fuel-efficient aircraft. Typically, each flight is around 84 per cent full, compared with a full-service carrier such as British Airways, whose average is more like 74 per cent. In doing so, budget airlines can claim that their fuel burn per passenger is over a quarter less than that of an airline that flies with a half-full premium cabin.
The black sheep of the airline industry, Ryanair's Michael O'Leary, is dismissive to the point of abuse about the environmental lobby, arguing there is absolutely no point in doing anything about airline emissions when the Chinese are opening two dirty coal-fired power stations a week.
O'Leary says the media in his homeland of Ireland does not have the green obsession of other countries. He quotes the statistic about shipping emissions and wryly adds that he awaits the first green picket at a ferry terminal. He is either bluntly honest or in characteristic wind-up mode when he says: "Nobody in the industry is overly concerned about CO2. But what we are all concerned about is oil at US$70 a barrel."
O'Leary, like his Easyjet counterpart, can argue that he operates a fuel-efficient fleet of aircraft, which he crams full of passengers, flying to uncongested airports with minimal fuel-wasting queues for the runway.
Both O'Leary and Harrison are correct about the comparative efficiency of modern aircraft. One of the workhorses of Easyjet and British Airways' fleets, an Airbus A319, emits 42 per cent less CO2 than its 1980s equivalent, the Boeing 737-200. The latter type was banished long ago from European skies thanks to noise regulations, and now guzzles gas in developing countries' airlines.
New aircraft types may help ease the conscience of regular travellers in the future. Carbon composite, once a military secret, is becoming the norm in the construction of new long-haul models, although no one has yet produced a composite short-haul aircraft. Boeing rolled out the first of its wide-bodied twin-jet 787s from the hangar in July. This aircraft, for which ANA is the launch customer, will carry around 300 passengers and consume 20 per cent less fuel than its equivalent, the 767.
The 787's development led Virgin Atlantic to abandon its "Four Engines 4 Long-Haul" policy and place an order, while claiming environmental credentials in the process. Airbus is a few years behind it with its mainly composite A350, for which Qatar Airways is the main customer.
Somerville has described the 787 as "a significant incremental improvement, but it is not a radical change in technology" .
"There is a need to consider more radical things," he says. These include Easyjet's futuristic prop-fan aircraft, blended wing designs and mixing biofuel with kerosene. But he adds: "There are land utilisation issues with biofuel. These things must be carefully assessed, so the timescale is quite long."
Airlines such as BA and Virgin have the budgets to renew their fleet regularly, but aircraft that are passed down the line end up with start-up carriers like Maxjet and Silverjet, two all-premium class carriers. Both fly Boeing 767s that are around 20 years old over the Greenland ice caps several times each day en route to the US. These planes were originally designed to carry up to 300 people – three times the number of seats that Maxjet and Silverjet offer. Silverjet's Luton-to-New York flight currently sells an average of 65 seats per journey, and Maxjet around 75, which, in pure numerical terms, does not make them environmentally-efficient compared with "don't care" Ryanair.
Eos's environmental credentials look slightly better. This all-business class carrier has no carbon offset scheme, but flies a Boeing 757, a smaller aircraft. Of the three, Silverjet can argue that it leads the way by including an offset fee in its ticket price. Others, such as BA, Easyjet, SAS and Delta, offer voluntary schemes (soon to be joined by Lufthansa and Virgin), but as one cynic put it, carbon offsetting is like donating money to the RSPCA so that you can carry on kicking your dog.
Other, smaller initiatives are being taken by airlines keen to prove they are moving towards being a greener business. In October, Virgin announced it would test a scheme whereby its aircraft would be towed from the gate to as near the runway as possible. This could potentially save thousands of tonnes of fuel and emissions at airports such as JFK, where the queue from gate to runway can often take over an hour. So far, though, nothing has been done.
SAS makes much of its "green" approach when landing. From the end of the year, its transatlantic flights will adopt a smooth glide path into airports, rather than the traditional stepped approach. SAS believes this will save between 600 and 950 kilos of CO2 emissions per landing. SAS is not, though, the first to use this technique, and it only works if the skies are uncongested and air traffic control allows it.
Lufthansa puts the onus back on national governments, which it claims could be doing more to make flying environmentally friendly. The German carrier is campaigning for a "Single European Sky", which would see air traffic control standardised across the EU, and which it claims would reduce emissions by 12 per cent. Marianne Sammann, general manager UK and Ireland, says: "If you have a single sky, as they do in the US, you have fewer holding patterns and routes can be much more efficient, which would cut emissions and flying time. The technical capability is there, but the political will is lacking – the EU is concentrating on emissions trading instead."
Only one UK airline, Flybe, has so far been bold enough to give any real prominence to environmental claims. It's copied the A to F grading used to show the energy efficiency of household appliances such as fridges, and displays these details on each flight.
The colour-coding shows CO2 emissions and noise footprints for each journey. Flybe can do this as its mainly turbo-prop fleets are fuel-frugal compared with jets. However, as 70 per cent of its flights are domestic, it can also be argued that its biggest competitor is the more environmentally-friendly train.
Rail travel is often held up as the saviour for the business traveller, but airlines would argue that there is little comparable data about the emissions generated to produce the electricity to power the rail network. French railways, on which Eurostar runs for the majority of its length, derive 70 per cent of their power from nuclear sources – not a source of CO2, but, some would argue, not really very green either.
Nevertheless, Climate Action Network Europe calculates that, on a London-to-Amsterdam journey, travelling by rail will save two-third's of an aircraft's emissions – 52g per passenger kilometre compared to 170g by air – but points out that travelling by car is almost as bad as flying. This is another fact that has been ignored in the search for an environmental scapegoat.
It is all very well to suggest we should jump on the train for short distances, but the bulk of aircraft emissions are from long-haul flights. "If you stop long-haul, you affect the most vulnerable economies in the world," said David Soskin, boss of Cheapflights, the price comparison website.
Soskin points out that Al Gore's polemical film, An Inconvenient Truth, makes no mention of flying. "The only time we see an aircraft is when Gore is travelling on one."
Soskin also argues that predictions about emissions in 2050 have no real credence. "As a businessman, I find it difficult to predict three or four years ahead – how they have the audacity to predict 40 years ahead is beyond me," he says. His, though, is not a popular view with the green consumer. Hysteria about flying has grown to the point where it is reminiscent of the wartime poster that asked: "Is Your Journey Really Necessary?"
The answer, sometimes, is probably not, but perhaps we should just stop worrying so much, turn the heating down, use the car less and persuade the Chinese to stop building those power stations instead.
