A flight that almost cost me my marriage
Here's the challenge: how do you illustrate, in a television report, the impact of flying on the environment?
It isn't as easy as you might think.
Three years ago, I pondered the problem with the Ethical Man producer, Sara, for a couple of days before we had a moment of genius.
Our solution infuriated my wife, enraged my colleagues and alienated a large section of our audience but I still stand by it.
So what was this brilliant idea?
We decided that I should illustrate the impact of flying by jetting off for a weekend in Jamaica.
I know. That's what my wife thought too.
And to make matters worse I filmed the moment I revealed our plans to her. You can watch my marriage disintegrate here.
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Please tell me if you think our approach was misguided.
For the record, here's my defence. We reasoned that if you watched our film and thought the idea of a man calling himself "ethical" flying off to Jamaica for the weekend smacked of hypocrisy, it might make you reflect on your own behaviour and consider flying less.
And, because we were keeping a tally of my carbon footprint, we reckoned the record of my flight would serve as a reminder of just how carbon-intensive flying is.
I did say this at the time but, judging by the avalanche of outraged emails we received, it fell on deaf ears.
The truth is, flying is the single most intractable climate change issue.
There is a solution to most of the other stuff - we can cut our energy use, change how we generate power, drive electric cars, eat less meat etc... but there is no alternative to flying.
And how we love to fly. A least one foreign holiday a year now seems to be regarded as pretty much a right of citizenship. Which is why politicians are so worried about stopping us doing it.
Why is flying such a problem?
Let's start with the good news: a couple of years ago I looked into the numbers and found that modern jet aeroplanes are actually a very efficient form of transport .
The jet engine is actually one of the most effective ways to convert the energy from fuel into thrust. The best jets are 37% efficient. By contrast modern petrol engines are around 25% efficient while a finely tuned diesel will achieve, at best, 32% efficiency.
How does that translate into actual fuel consumption?
Take a look at some figures: my old car - a two litre petrol Saab 9-5 estate - uses 8.6 litres per 100km.The most efficient cars do better than that. The Toyota Prius, for example, is much more frugal. It uses 4.3l/100km.
So what about aircraft? The average jet plane now uses around 4.8l/100km per passenger - just a little worse than a Prius with no passengers. But the manufacturers say modern jets are much more efficient.
Airbus claims it makes the most efficient aeroplane currently flying, the A380. It says this behemoth uses just 2.9l/100km per passenger. (Here's the dull bit: that's the fuel consumption when you assume a three class configuration operating at capacity with 525 passengers.)
So far as I can tell, the latest jumbos are similarly efficient - it is hard to be certain because the manufacturers do not publish comparable figures - but Boeing's 747-8 uses 3.7l/100km per passenger when operating at 70% capacity. (Assuming it is configured to hold 470 passengers in three classes.)
So, if jet engines are more efficient than car engines why do they get such a bad rap?
The anwer is pretty obvious - we use planes to travel extremely long distances. That weekend in Jamaica racked up just over 15,000km. That's pretty much what the average British driver would do in an entire year.
The other problem is that planes release their pollutants high up in the atmosphere where they have an even stronger greenhouse effect. The process is known as radiative forcing and means aircraft emissions are reckoned to be almost twice as damaging as emissions at ground level.
So, combine the distance you fly with the effect of radiative forcing and you can see why our appetite for air travel is so worrying.
You can do as I did - get rid of your car , switch to energy efficient bulbs , eat locally grown food - but take one holiday flight and you will erase all your careful carbon cuts.
So what are the alternatives?
Here's the rub. As my figures show, even if you did take the car instead of the plane you would still emit huge amounts of carbon, because of the vast distances covered in most journeys by air.
I've already done the maths on trains and buses. If you pack them full of passengers they will offer some carbon savings but, like cars, they leave the tricky little challenge of crossing oceans. Boats will do that job but there's a hefty carbon price to pay there too.
And these alternatives ignoring perhaps the most important feature of flying: it is extremely fast.
Lots of environmentalists regard speed as some kind of crime but much (not all) time spent travelling is time not spent doing something else - often a productive activity. So there is an economic cost to slow travel.
So what's the answer?
It's a tough one isn't it? Do write in if you've got any good ideas.
In the meantime how about this: establish a price system that accurately reflects the impact that carbon emissions have on the environment? That way the price of a plane ticket would include all the costs of our holiday.
It would mean we would all fly less, of course. But, given the problems my weekend in Jamaica caused me, maybe that would not be such a bad thing.
I'm Justin Rowlatt and I am the BBC's Ethical Man. My family and I spent a year trying to cut our carbon emissions and reporting on the exercise for 
~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~49~RS~)
Comments
For the short term (until the tech improves), you are correct, the only way around it, is to fly less. (preferably not at all)
There are actually be many ways existing technology could be implemented to provide trans-oceanic travel, carbon-free. But traveling half as often (but for twice as long), could make moving at half the speed easier.
A lifting-body wing-shaped plane, could get extra lift from a small lighter than air chamber, or super slippery top. That extra boost would mean that the wing (plane really) would be smaller and thus easier to push though the air. Still current batteries and capacitors will need a lot of improvement, before they can power a 100 person jet up to 500 KM/hr.
Or we could just build two (3 or 4) long launching tunnels and ramps (for every major city), and use magnets to get electric planes airborne.
Or if you have loads of time and energy, you could sail (in a boat) carbon-free across the ocean.
Or we could just finish the job (that was interrupted by the failure 80 years ago to ban private motor vehicles) of building an interconnected rail transportation for all the people of this planet.
Only the will is missing.
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Given the amount of concern over carbon dioxide emissions from aircraft why do our international climate debate groups insist on flying from one freebie conference to another in city after city? Flying the President of the USA to Copenhagen, for example, involves much more than even one plane - Airforce 1 - as the extra security personnel etc must also be flown to the destination city. Crass hypocrisy when we have quite capable and efficient video conferencing so that the respective individuals can stay at home and still talk to each other. Like everything in life it appears that 'cuts', 'savings', 'economising' etc will be done by us - the ordinary people who are already over-taxed, poorly represented and collectively ignored - and will not affect the 'important' people.
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I'm getting married in two weeks in Penang, Malaysia. My fiance is from the USA so his mum and dad, sisters, and some family friends are coming over. I'm going to soothe my conscience by putting an appropriate amount of carbon credits on our wedding gift wish list and if nobody buys them for us, we're going to buy them out of our cash gifts (I love being Chinese, people just give you cold hard cash).
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Like so many other articles on "climate change" (the new politically correct label for global warming) and carbon footprints, you talk primarily about the downside of jetting around the planet, that it is somehow about Western greed and waste, putting lifestyle ahead of the environment. But what about the economic BENEFITS of travel to the Caribbean or Pacific islands, or to Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa, or even to the former Soviet bloc. If everyone were to stop flying there, it would be catastrophic as they rely on tourism so greatly.
My house has double-glazing, loft and cavity-wall insulation, I turn off lights and electronic gadgets when not in use, my gas and electric consumption has been reducing year on year for 20 years (although not the cost), I have a small garden full of plants and huge trees that consume CO2, I cycle rather than drive where practicable, and yes I like to enjoy a holiday or two now I am retired. I have no plans to change things.
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Happy to give up foreign holidays if everyone else does. Takers?
We don't need fewer aircraft, just fewer people wanting to fly.
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What nonsense.
As detailed in a recent BBC report, climate change sceptic scientists have asserted that 98% of greenhouse gas is... water vapour. Nothing else, but water vapour. Other scientific reports suggest that anything between 66% and 85% of supposed greenhouse gas is nothing more than vapourised water. Not exactly the big nasty of CO2 - but rather, something that forms a natural part of our environment, and something (H2O) that simply cannot be 'increased' by human factors.
Couple this, with other scientific suggestions - and this appears to form a greater consensus among scientists - that our global output of CO2 from oil sources combined, including all vehicles, does not even come close to the level of methane output just from cows.
I am not a scientist, and therefore I cannot say for certain precisely what is going on. All I can do is examine the wealth of scientific understanding that seems to suggest that global warming is definitely not man-made.
Unlike something as culturally contentious as evolution, the scientific community simply has not reached a consensus about this. And that, you must acknowledge, has serious impact on the credibility of global understanding and sympathy over global warming, as well as the total fecklessness of international governments when forming a decision based on part-truths and unverified understandings.
Until there is a consensus, consider me a happy, sound and peaceful man when flying to South Africa from Glasgow later this month. 10,000km there and back, here I come!!
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As you point out, flying is currently a very low percentage of total emissions, about 3%. There is at least a 50% improvement in fuel efficiency over the next thirty years, it comes from improved operations (more direct routing, less time on the ground etc.), improved airframes and improved engines. Those curvy bits on the wingtips are not just there to make the new aeroplanes look pretty nor are the fancy curves on the fans of the new engines. Add to that the fact that flight testing of second generation biofuels is well advanced and the green flying-phobia looks to have less of a case. 50% improvement combined wiht 50% biofuels means that we could have four times as much flying without any increased impact or the same amount with a quarter the impact or anything in between.
BTW if you accept that the various climate models are reasonable, you will have a problem with the higher estimates of additional forcing from high level emissions. The models work pretty well without including them. You could join the climate sceptics and reject the models, otherwise you could cool off on aviation and go and insulate your loft!
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I do not feel guilty about flying, as I do it at most once a year, and everyone deserves a break. Those trying to oppress us should instead concentrate on the huge number of unnecessary business trips made. I suspect the majority of these 'important' meetings could be conducted using the excellent communication technology we have at our disposal.
Also in the UK, much of the domestic flying could be reduced by having direct long haul flights from Birmingham, Manchester and Glasgow. Why have 10+ flights a day from LHR to Japan, when there are none from these airports? I know the stock answer to this is that LHR sells more business and first class seats, so we then have to decide whether money or carbon emissions are most important to us. I think I know what the answer will be,
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Uh...you could stay home. Global travel is responsible for all sorts of nasty things from pollution to spread of disease to contamination of eco-systems with invasive, non-native species, etc. Humans are disgusting creatures really. No wonder the planet is trying to get rid of us. Unless you are a diplomat or your job absolutely requires you to travel (because of technology, many jobs no longer do), flying is about the single most irresponsible activity you can do.
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The worlds population is only going to grow, and with it, the need for flying.
Perhaps we could all encourage the major (and not so major) airline companies to implement carbon offsets for all flights?
Raising ticket costs might also help dissuade the "unnecessary" flights ... heck, why not put a hefty price increase on flights that aren't of upmost importance and leave the 'meaningful' flights as they are (expensive enough!).
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As with most things the effects of us flying less are highly complex.
Take eating local food for example, sounds good in theory, but what about all those people in Africa/S America counting oun you buying their food who now can't afford to make a living, the only way Africa can become less dependent on aid is to sell more stuff to the "1st world", remove this opportunity and we'll have a whole continent of people accusing us of ruining them. quite justifiably too.
The same with air travel. Cut it and you will destroy an awful lot of cities, and even countries who rely on tourism, not just that but if all those Brits stay home instead can our road infrastructure really cope with us all going to Cornwall for 2 weeks instead? Then think of the impact building all the extra hotels would have on our country to house the extra people, the impact of the holiday activity places, the extra restaurants to feed the holiday makers and soon this "simple" cut means we could actually cause more problems than we solve in this country, never mind ruining the places we can't go.
As shown yesterday by climate protestors in Wales asking for more to be done after objecting to an off shore windfarm, if environmentals can't agree amongst themselves what's to be done, what hope for the rest of us!
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All these eco-warriors make me seethe with anger. Usually middle class jobworths who can afford the new fares while feeling smug in their angora cardigans. I'M NOT giving up my foreign WARM / HOT holidays - do YOU hear ME? If you want to, please do so - I will not stop you. I live in a modestly deprived area of south London called Croydon, as I don't drive, and as I don't do the countryside, and no more will I try to exchange the "pleasures" of central Croydon for the "pleasures" of central Manchester, Bristol, York or Bath. I've tried all of them, and would happily swop these "pleasures" for somewhere hot and somewhere less expensive for more enjoyment.
Perhaps some of the problem is the constant harping by these eco-warriors that we are all doomed to die which is switching me off, and also the Government's insistence to tackle all climate change with ever more taxes which convinces me that this is one massive con-trick. I convince myself my contribution is to have the remote by my side and switch the TV off anytime the BBC or ITV do the "doomsday" effect of global warming.
Mind you, eco-warriors, there is one plus point you might care to consider - no travel, less immigration. Sell that one to the people - it just might just work...
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Why not sail there in a sailing ship or float there in an airship?
This weekend trip was just a journalistic stunt and your article is a stunted argument. And really why not stop all passenger flights and we'll see if the world stops turning? I'll bet it keeps on turning and I'll bet a lot of business actually gets done on the internet with video conferencing like it promised it would do and encourage local industry and local initiatives instead of relying on all the financial eggs in one rotten basket in the City Of London.
And really .... NOW it is now time to treat man made climate change deniers with the same law as holocaust denial. There's no time for their military industrial complex, building industry, and agro chem industry sponsored bigotry any longer.
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Climate Change isn't that hard to understand. It's about sustainability.
Millions of years of solar energy were stored as carbon in the form of oil, gas, coal etc. In just a few years we humans have used loads of this energy allowing some of us to do things that would have been impossible without it, like travel all over the place at increasingly fast speeds. We've got 'rich'. All this energy has also meant that loads more people can stay alive longer, burning ever more carbon. Great in the short term, but when carbon is burnt some of it is released as carbon dioxide, which is adding an extra tog or two to the duvet that is the Earth's atmosphere. Add too many togs and we (and all the other life we share the planet with) start sweating.
So we have to find other ways than by burning carbon, if it's not already too late, so that we can continue to live the 'rich' lives we enjoy without adding yet more togs to the duvet. And/or we have to get used to the idea of doing less (becoming 'poorer'), and/or we have to learn not to make so many new people.
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I cannot understand why flying, which contributes 2% of so-called 'greenhouse gases', is such an easy target while other activities which have a far greater impact ion the environment never attract any criticism at all. The rainforests are being destroyed at an ever increasing rate; deforestation is a far bigger cause of CO2 emissions than aircraft and if the forests vanished that really WILL wreck the climate. Not only that, because of deforestation and human overpopulation, we are also losing other animal and plant species which is absolutely tragic. Why are the so-called climate experts and eco-worriers, such as 'Ethical Man', not addressing deforestation?
While I have no doubt the earth is warming (of which human activities are but one cause) what makes me so annoyed is the fact the Government is quick to slap taxes on us in the name of climate change, but are these taxes going towards green power generation and alternative ways of powering aircraft, cars, ships and so on? I wouldn't object if they were, but to read, a few weeks ago, that the Chancellor admitted that airline taxes weren't, after all, intended as a green measure, despite the public having been told they were, but were instead used to bail out the banks then people have every right to question it and be angry about it.
I have no children, not do I intend having children - overpopulation is the greatest threat to both other species and to us. I don't eat meat and I don't drive as much as I used to. However, I have no intention of giving up travelling and that includes long-haul flying. I have to get out of the increasingly depressing UK once in a while.
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Personally, I'm about to purchase a part-share in a private jet because a). I hate airports and b). unlike the BBC (or at least the majority of it) I consider AGW to be the biggest con of all time and I will not participate in this hysterical "we only have 17 days to save the planet" fervour.
I expect this comment will be 'moderated' out of existence because the good old BBC can't be seen releasing too many of these sceptic comments for fear that it might show that the MAJOROTY of people in this country are sick to death of having this rubbish thrown down their throats.
Get some real (rather than ficticious) scientific evidence first.
Yours (as a fully paid up member of the flat-earth society),
Mr.Carbon
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"Like so many other articles on "climate change" (the new politically correct label for global warming)"
No, that would be more scientifically accurate.
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Flying less is important. We can also offset the impact when we do fly. How about including in your travel budget a donation to protect an acre of rainforest? Or incorporate travel with volunteering in a country you are interested in?
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Haven't been abroad for 20 years so preach it to me! hypocrisy is saying you shouldn't do what we did it's wrong! Or conversly saying you should do what we did. Maybe I don't want to! To me ethics and morality is about whether you harm or heal. What we know is wrong is deliberate harm to others.
Some people might say that christianity is a fallen idol, when it says do to others as you wish others would do to you. The end result of wrongdoing is death and the end result of well doing is life.
I do not see how that is wrong or an erroneous way describing life in action. The murderers go to jail because they killed someone and so lose their lives when the doctor who saves a life is appreciated and thanked and so he is encouraged. He is happy.
It is impossible for the word of God, Jesus himself to be wrong.
The problem with calculating emissions anyway is the same as the problem in the wider economy. what you do doesn't count unless it's measured but lots of people do work that is unpaid. So you might be offsetting small amounts of carbon that you measured but missing emissions from elsewhere.
The end result is that you have not achieved the goal of actually reducing the total amount of carbon dioxide, and 'other' greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
It's another way of saying we can have everything we want but passing the cost to others. That is what the basic problem in the economy has been and is and will be.
If you say that if you do x,y and z then you will be doing better than we did, then that is not hypocrisy.
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Dare I mention biofuels? Some experiments with biofuel powered engines have been carried out, and with promising results. Sure, producing the biofuels is not carbon free, and the net effect would not be zero, but it'd be an improvement on the status quo. At least, in the short term, there is a lot of promise in biofuels reducing the impact of aviation: the modifications to jet engines would be comparably small.
In the long term, the answer may well have to be hydrogen powered aircraft engines. Hydrogen which, in turn, would have to be produced on the ground, probably through nuclear energy.
There are a number of ways in which governments could accelerate the development of such propulsion systems. There could be competitions with financial prizes for engine manufacturers (the Ansari X-Prize did, after all, lead to privately funded rocket vehicles capable of reaching the border of space / leave the atmosphere), or there could be a heavily subsidised promise of free hydrogen fuel for 10 years (say, 2018 to 2028) for any passenger aircraft fueled purely with hydrogen. Believe me, if airlines could rely on ten years of free fuel, there'd be a noticeable demand for aircraft manufacturers to give them planes that could capitalise on that offer - and they'd be willing to pay a hefty price tag on those planes. One single, medium sized government (eg the UK) could probably have a massive influence with such a promise: It would be worthwhile for an airline to replace all its planes based in that country with hydrogen ones, and the replaced ones could be used for growth and expansion elsewhere, or sold.
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I was worried you would suggest including the 'environmental' damages to the cost of the travel the moment I read the title of the blog. We live in a very ambitious planet and people's travel-affordabilities vary from 'never-left-my-town-in-my-life' to 'seen-the-whole-planet' to 'vacationed-in-the-moon'! How about costing the airline tickets higher for customers with a Bentley, and moderately for customers who drive Toyotas and Hondas, and 'dirt-cheap' for souls who ride bicycles to work?
The concept of making sacrifices for future generations is totally reversed here. We are making sacrifices for both the well-being of our future generations and for the careless, perverse treatment of the planet by the generations we are taking over from. And taking orders from. While they still drive around in their Bentleys and Rolls-Royces, flying private jets for birthday parties, and wearing fuzzy animals around their necks!
If its not a unified, self-motivated effort, its not a fair and productive effort.
P.S. I belong to a region somewhere between the Bentley and the Toyotas, and these comments are not to be disregarded as 'just another lament by someone complaining about the unfair division of wealth in the world'.
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Do climatologists really walk around in the real world in white coats? You guys were so fake they didn't bother to send anyone down.
Let's pretend to be scientist. How do we do that? We wear white lab coats. That'll fool them.
They're called lab coats for a reason. Scientists don't wear them to meetings.
2/3
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When the politicians stop taking hundreds of staff on rich junkets to talk about a myth, I will stop taking modest holidays in the sun, and experiencing foreign locations and the real friends you can make in other countries.
The "Greens" are the modern version of Luddites.
Since the innovative Wright brothers invention changed the world, politicians may like to overtax us, (and what an opportunity global warming myths give them), but as people have modern aids, like instant communication,and access to the real truth of things, control by any politicians becomes the "last refuge of scoundrels", (which is what a lot of them are anyway).
And if a disagreement about the alleged "climate change" can break up a marriage, perhaps there wasn`t much love in the arrangement in the first place.
Suggest, as a simple start you sit down and watch the documentary series about the origins of the world by Aubrey Manning.This explains, step by step how the earth was formed, how the climate works, and how little effect man`s activities have.
Rather than just listen to idiots like Johnathan Porritt, who calls people who do not agree with his point of view "liars", suggest that, if the aforesaid programme does not convince you, try reading "Theoram on Climate Forcing" by Malenkovitch.
Get yourself more educated on our planet, and less embroiled in political dogma, put about for reasons of tax, and possibly control.
Consider that, in 1902,manned flight was by baloon or kite only.
Consider how far we have travelled in science since then, and the strides civilisation has made.
In only 1936, Imperial Airlines catered for only the rich, and but for massive development of aircraft, would still only cater for the rich and influential.
The aircraft therefore is an instrument of democracy. As may be noted, this concept does not exist in the "global warming/Green movement", which, using religious zeal, condemns those who hold opposite views, and, as the article implied, also comes between man and wife!
Well, this is not new. Facist men & women betrayed their neighbours to secret police for similar motives in the last century, (for their beliefs.)So what else is new??
So don`t worry about having holidays or flying to see relatives across the world. Leave her (or him) behind if she/he really cannot agree with flight as a transport system. For this system is fuel efficient and democratic, unlike the undemocratic antics of the climate change mob!
And if you live to see 2050, ring me as you realise that your 2009 ideas were wrong all along!!
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I think a few points need emphasising.
Firstly, there is no practical alternative to long haul flights. However it would do no harm to encourage passengers to find out how to reduce their footprint by avoiding low occupancy flights, first class seats, inefficient planes etc.
Secondly, the most damaging journeys are journeys to work. Many people take their cars to work, park them in the car park and drive them home. If they were to take the bus / train they could use this time efficiently and make a significant contribution not only to CO2 reduction, but reduced use of non-renewables, safety, noise pollution and traffic congestion. So there are many reasons to take action - not just CO2. But, as with air travel, if you own a car it is cheaper to take it to work than to leave it at home and take the bus. The falling cost of car travel has also encouraged people to live further away from their work places, so it is a double whammy! Again, government has to be brave and sort out the economics. One way would be to encourage companies to charge employees for parking in the office car park and use the proceeds to subsidise green transport, improve energy efficiency or install renewable generation like wind and solar.
Thirdly, I am surprised that sea travel is inefficient. I would love to see the economics behind this. I have looked at using ferries to get to the continent and Ireland but the prices for foot passengers are astronomical.
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My take as a failed Mechanical Engineer from Birmingham University....
What causes inefficient fuel consumption is friction. Ther's lots of friction in cars between rubber tyre and road, much less on the railway train with shiny steel wheel on shiny steel rail, and virtually none at all on aircraft. OK some friction if the winds not blowing exactly behind you but not very much.
So why are planes bad ? Well if they fly at say 100' they would be a very efficient means of getting around the country, - problems stopping I agree, but they would use less fuel than any other means of transport except foot or pedal bike.
But of course the lower the height the more the turbulence, which is why planes try to fly as high as possible.
Mind you the big waste of fuel concerned with flying is all those drivers zipping round the country returning luggage lost by your airline (over 100 such vehicles at Heathrow alone)!! Maybe thats what we should concentrate on.
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Future technology is the answer. Or modified old technology, that is.
Turtle Airships, that is rigid airships with an outer shell that is a lightweight polymer, are the future of sustainable air travel.
Basically, they're airships with loss-proof helium air bags (no Hindenburg incidents as they don't make use of explosive hydrogen) that use a hybrid drive:
The top of the airship is covered with solar cells, they can achieve the altitude to get above the clouds, and they have a system of fuel-cells that store energy for night travel, and a diesel back up for emergency purposes.
They'd be much more spacious and comfortable than traditional airplanes. Travel would take slightly longer, but because of their shape and construction, they would be faster than the airships of old.
And who wouldn't mind an airplane where one could walk around without being crammed into those awful seats constantly?
And they'd be much safer than airplanes. Because the vessels are lighter-than-air, an accident means that they float slowly to the ground rather than crashing into it catastrophically. Terrorist attacks would be ineffective. A bomb-blast would damage part of the vessel, but would be hard pressed to bring the entire vehicle down. Again, the "crash" would be a slow drift, followed by the passengers being put on life boats or the ground in an orderly fashion. The vital parts of the craft could be secured in order
This is why the US military has been experimenting with rigid airship technology. Toying with the idea, really. It is theoretically possible to build a rigid airship that could take multiple hits from enemy fire and remain undamaged. Theoretically, of course, this would cost more than 500 black hawk helicopters. The concept of a lighter-than-air floating fortress will probably never occur: the armor would weigh the craft down too much for it to be effective, and the vehicle is *huge* and therefor hard to miss when you're shooting it.
But for passenger applications (faster than ocean travel, ecologically sustainable, more comfortable) "turtle airships" seem to be the best bet.
Theoretically, that is. Because none of the companies prepared to build them have received the right amount of investment yet.
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1) I wonder whether your comparison is correct: you quote flight fuel consumption in l/100km/passenger whereas you use l/100 km for cars. Therefore, an average car carrying 2 passengers with a fuel consumption of (say) 7 l/100km uses 3.5l/100km/passenger - very similar to a plane. But those fuel consumptions are measured under optimal conditions, ignoring, e.g., standing in a traffic jam for 4 hours on your way to France, with the A/C on full power.
2)The solution for now is: Don't go far but spend your holidays in France/Italy/Spain and fly instead of driving.
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I'm very green concious, but, travelling by plane is sometimes something we have to do. For instance, I wanted to go see my partner, who currently lives far abroad from England. I had no alternate method of getting to this country without driving through Iraq. Or passing the Horn of Africa, or Suez Canal.
I decided to fly, for fairly obvious reasons. I just can't "stop flying". I can stop taking holidays though, not that I ever started!
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With World Wide Web, why bother to go to another Country ?
Google Earth allows me to see into most back yards in the World.
Never needed a Passport, nor do I have a Driving Licence. Plenty to see in the UK. But how about fewer aircraft, but those still in service carry more, like the Airbus A380.
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I enjoy my holiday abroad, how many world leaders, polticians and hangers on are flying to Copenhagen, any where else in the world?
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Who really cares?? its a tax con
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This obsession with flying shows that underneath it all the eco-worriers real problem is with modern life - modernity.
Flying is great. Fly to a business meeting - to a family occasion or to a well-deserved holiday. A great way to get around quickly and cheaply.
Yum yum.
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The article has a very eye-catching sub-title for me. Maybe this is because you actually wanted the attention.
I have to say that I find it exagerating to talk only and always about the holiday-flyers. Why never mention the business people (I'm sure you know a few of them) who get off a plane only to get onto another - not once or twice in a year but monthly, weekly, daily! How can we ever forget that this is work for some people and business is a key driver in the flying industry? Or why not even question Stephen Fry who goes and makes pathetic programs like 'Last Chance to See' flying all around the world to film endangered animals, as if that would save them! How about having some perspective?
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@NHJ
An important chapter in the Green-Bible describes personal exemption. So it's OK to fly to - say Denmark if you are doing The Gaia's Work.
Or fly to the Arctic if you want to film some ice melting.
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If you agree that the richer you are the more resources and energy you consume, how do you reconcile this with ethics which should be like laws and applicable to everyone regardless of wealth?
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Can I suggest that you focus on what really makes a difference. Airplanes contribute between 2 - 3% of total CO2 emmissions globally. Take the flight to Jamica, in fact take 3 of them and whilst you are there consider eating a lot less meat. Close to 50% of all green house gases are produced in the farming of animals for consumption.
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Flying creates a very small proportion of CO2 emissions, but attracts a very large proportion of human envy. It certainly should be in the list of priorities for action, probably somewhere near the very bottom.
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Expand your sample base and come visit "Clean, Green New Zealand", and while you're here plant a pretty pahutakawa tree, then everything will be peachy, right? (What’s a few tonnes of soot between friends?) As enjoyable as your essay is, and it is, I still can't swallow the claim that those noodle-bulbs actually save so much energy. On the rule that "If it sounds too good to be true..." Even the construction of the device is so complicate and they don’t last like the old Edison bulb, not by half. Still, your scientific method is enviable.
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Ah, I get it now.
I don't have to reduce my carbon emissions I just have to spend three hundred quid a year to offset. woot.
Thanks for letting me know this.
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As far as the green house gas emission math goes, if you don't eat meat for six months, you earn the right to circumnavigate the earth once on a jet plane.
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I fly once a week from Leeds to Southampton and back again in the same day and you know what ? i don't feel guilty i don't actually think it matters what we do or what effect we have . . . This planets been around a lot longer than we have and will be around a lot longer after we have gone.
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We all already know options that will help us to reduce our footprint on the world, we all seem to be opposed to doing it though. Most people would agree that people use their cars too much, yet no one is willing to cycle to work or god forbid, walk. The other issue that seems to get brushed aside is the fact the world is quite clearly overpopulated, the optimum human population was predicted to be around 4 billion worldwide and we are fast approaching 7 billion. Even if we half our footprint now, as the population increases we will find the same problems as we are now, no matter how efficient our engines become.
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How much carbon does a single Eurofighter kick out and for that matter how many gallons to the mile does a Challenger II. spew out?
There again how much methane is 6 billion humans emmiting into the atmosphere each year? The list could go on and on. Goverments and activists should take stock before throwing out their "papist" claptrap.
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Interesting choice of destination, Jamaica.
As are those selected for most eco jamborees.
I once mentioned to an American friend in a conversation on crime rates that California seemed to 'enjoy' a high % of odd murders.
His reply? 'They may be crazy, but at least they know enough to be that way where the weather's nice'.
I guess dumps don't have nice conference centres. Or the delegate wives.. er.. spouses... might not fancy coming along for the duty frees. 35 from here, 20,000 from there.
Quite a lot of credibility of some behaviour change advocates with their public might hinge on folk doing what they say others should do. Or not.
I, for one, don't get in a plane for fun, even if it's to visit the in-laws in Singapore. But next time we do, I'll be sure to explain that it's actually to illustrate a point. Or something.
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What a load of rubbish. All based on the assumption (backed up by dodgy CRU so called science) that CO2 causes Global Warming.
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Unfortunately, what takes priority now, is sharing one's views that manmade climate change is real. One might choose a vacation spot specifically based on international tourist presence to do this. (Miami comes to mind) If one can educate others, maybe even convert (especially an American) skeptic, THAT would count for more savings than the flight itself. Staying home and sharing ideas with a little group of like-minded conservationists, will not work, because this is a global problem. If the degree of skepticism remains the same any one person's conservation efforts will be for nothing.
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Have I missed something? When did God (or whoever/whatever you all believe in)give us the right to fly whenever and wherever we like? Was it at the same time as we were given the right to get in our cars on a Saturday night, go to the pub, drink six pints and then drive home again? Yes, sadly I am old enough to remember the fierce arguments put up against the introduction of the breathalyser when it was introduced back when cars had square wooden wheels and petrol cost 30pence a gallon (Yes I did mean 30p a gallon). We all now accept(well, most of us) that this is about the most antisocial thing you can do.
So, it is about time we all got used to the notion that flying anywhere is also pretty antisocial. One longhaul flight(for no reason other than "I can so I will go there") produces pretty much the same amount of carbon per passenger as you will use in the rest of your activities in a year and, because that carbon and all the other greenhouse gases (including water vapour) are released at 35,000 feet their effect is doubled - so that's two years of doing nothing else to make up for one trip to Jamaica.
So don't tell me you can't give it up, tell the person in Bangladesh who has just lost his home and livelihood to yet another hurricane or, better still, tell it to the people in the Maldives next time you are there, because the islands won't be around for much longer if you don't stop and THINK about what you are doing to the planet. Yes, the Maldives are disappearing below the rising waters of the Pacific Ocean.
It's really quite simple. If you have the slightest feeling for the future of this planet and all who live on it, flying for pleasure is unsustainable and the sooner governments stand up and say so the better.
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On the issue of carbon offsetting it really is a very daft proposal as outlined by using 'cheat offsetting'. Effectively paying somebody else to stay faithful to a partner to counteract your unfaithfulness... daft right?
Youtube clip explaining just that, and how seriously some people took it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3_CYdYDDpk
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The thing that makes flight the most difficult to remove the CO2 from is that the mass of the plane is a critical factor, meaning high-energy-density fuels like kerosene are favoured.
There is however one fuel combination that is capable of much higher speeds and emits zero CO2. It's been tested hundreds of times and is compatible with a hydrogen economy (hydrogen produced from nuclear/renewables etc.). I'm talking about rocket fuel (2H2 + O2 -> 2H2O)!
In the nearer term, before we travel on space planes, I'd just suggest tackling the CO2 emissions *as we can*. There is a finite about of biofuel that can be produced, so reserve that firstly for powering planes, while cars and trains can go electric. [All the above assumes electricity production has already been dealt with.]
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I think you should all go to the mountains and go take a look at the impact that the subject of this debate has on the environment. In the name of research of course!!!
In my 14 years for frequenting Chamonix in the French Alps, I've seen glaciers that once stood within touching distance, retreat at least a hundred metres back.
Very sad, but true!!!
This is one of the reasons amongst many that I have been working on and recently launched a website called Mountain Rideshare.
So...
Do yourself a favour n take a trip to the mountains! Get married there if you like. Take a look at some of the beauty in all its snowy glory before you can't.
Oh and don't bother flying if you can help it. Try www.mountainrideshare.com
ECO|FRIENDLIER - ECO|NOMICAL - ECO|LOGICAL!!!!
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I find it interesting that in the climate debate the item that takes the most criticism is air travel, air travel contributes 2% of global carbon emissions. Why aren't people focussing on much higher contributors which make up the other 98% like energy production/shipping etc.
Flying is an easy target but I think people really need to start focussing on issues that can really make a change rather than making a form of transportation that contributes so much to global GDP a scapegoat.
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I’m repeating information I’ve posted before, with some changes to reflect new information:
At noon on an average clear day at mid-latitudes, solar radiation is 1000 watts per square meter.
If a North American homeowner uses 1 megawatt-hour per month at 10 cents per kilowatt-hour, their monthly power bill is $100. This would be typical for an apartment dweller, a bit low for a single family home.
Combining the population of the US (300 million) and the UK (60 million) and dividing by an average of 2.5 people per home is 144 million homes, which rounds up to 150 million nicely.
American motorists drive about 40 miles per day, and there is one car per adult. Britain is probably less, but using the American number yields about 270 million cars times 360 days times 40 miles or 4 trillion miles per year.
A house using 1 megawatt-hour per year uses 32 kilowatt-hours per day. Divided by the 16 hours people are up and around, this is 2 kilowatts continuously. When electricity is used for air conditioning and heating, this is divided by 24, and comes out to a bit more than 1.25 kilowatts.
150 million homes times 2 kilowatts is 300 gigawatts of power demand. US power generation capacity is closer to 1 trillion watts, or 1 terawatt.
1 trillion watts divided by 1000 watts per square meter is 1 billion square meters. 1 billion square meters divided by 1 million square meters per square kilometer is 1000 square kilometers. The square root of 1000 is 31 kilometers or so, times .6 is less than 20 miles. So at 100% conversion efficiency, daily peak demand could be met with a surface area one fourth the size of an average American county.
Since total solar exposure over a day is equivalent to about 5 hours of peak, one has to multiply this number by 4.8 to meet day to day demand, or at this point 1.25 counties.
‘Cheap’ solar cells made with thin-film printing technology are about 11% efficient. Therefore we multiply the 1.25 counties by 9 to get the surface area needed to convert at existing yields, or 12 counties.
Another way of looking at this is that an average American house is about 1800 square feet, and with 2.5 people living in it each person uses less than 750 square feet (75 square meters). 32 kilowatt-hours per day divided by 5 hours exposure is 6+ kilowatts, and at 11% conversion efficiency this requires 60 square meters or 600 square feet of surface area to power the house.
Keyword search ‘$1 per watt solar panel’. At least two companies claim they have passed this cost barrier.
A car driven 40 miles per day is using the equivalent of about 12 kilowatt-hours of electricity. In a two working adult family, this would be 24 kilowatt-hours per day. So on top of the 600 square feet required to gather energy for the house, this couple would need another 500 square feet to ‘recharge’ the cars, if they were electric. Only 700 square feet of roof area is left after that for other purposes.
In areas with electrically powered mass transit, the extra rooftop solar could simply power the streetcars and subways.
A car driven 40 miles per day is 15,000 miles per year, or 750 gallons of fuel at 20 miles per gallon. A trip to Jamaica is 15,000 miles round trip. Using another 250 square feet of rooftop to gather the energy for the vacation is sufficient for one person. To bring the spouse and kids, however, one will need correspondingly more. On a family/homeowner basis, we’re now at a total of 1750 square feet. However, making a hydrocarbon fuel from electricity results in about 30% efficiency, so instead of adding 625 square feet, it is necessary to add 1875 square feet, or more area than the average house covers. The overspill would have to either cover patios and driveways; or parking lots, warehouses, schools, or supermarkets.
Keyword search ‘transform carbon dioxide into methanol’.
Various methods have been proposed to do this since the mid 1970s. The significance of methanol is that it breaks down into 2xH2 and CO (hydrogen and carbon monoxide), otherwise known as synthesis gas, at about 600 degrees. Synthesis gas is used to make long chain hydrocarbons, including jet fuel, using FT synthesis. This is the technology Germany and South Africa used at various times to make oil from coal.
While the energy gathered from rooftops is the ‘net’ consumed by the vehicle, the synthesis costs are several times that of the resulting fuel. Thus making jet fuel would require 3x the energy actually consumed by the jet on it’s round trip.
At $1 per watt, a 6Kw house would need $6000 invested in solar panels, which would take 60 months or five years to pay back at $100 per month. A car using 12Kwh per day would need 3Kwh of recharging capacity, or $3000, divided by 1200 miles per month divided by 20 miles per gallon at $2.50 per gallon is $150 per month. Payback on the recharging component of an electric car is 20 months, if everything works out perfectly.
A family of three would need 2250 gallons (times six pounds) of jet fuel to make the trip to Jamaica, or 13500 pounds. Jet fuel is a mix of c6, c12, and c16 hydrocarbons, so it’s safe to say the average is a 26 hydrogen, 12 carbon molecule, with a molecular weight of 170.
The weight of the CO2 that has to be converted is therefore 12 molecules times a molecular weight of 44, or 524. At a ratio of 144 (the carbon component) to 524 (the CO2), we need 39,300 pounds (or roughly 20 tons) of CO2 to make the corresponding jet fuel. If it is necessary to use three times as much energy to synthesize the fuel as it is to use it, then the 20 month payback on the electric car now expands to 60 months, or $9000. Dividing the $9000 by five years is $1800 per vacation in fuel costs, which wouldn’t surprise anyone, but a lot of people would probably settle for a hop across the Channel instead.
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Firstly, thank you to the moderators for allowing my comments through and apologies for the appalling spelling of "MAJORITY". However, reading other comments here I would say that I have perhaps understated the point.
It would appear that the VAST MAJORITY of people think the whole thing is a con.
But I guess when a politician sees a tax-raising band-wagon there is no way on this God's earth he/she is not going to jump on board with both feet.
Yours,
Mr. Carbon.
ps: Anyone else read about the total number of limos and private jets on display in Copenhagen this week ? Laugh - I nearly wet myself....!!
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I saw a very interesting documentary the other day saying how man-made global warming is all a LIE. And it was very convincing.
I urge all of you to see it, it's called The Great Global Warming Swindle.
The real scientific data has been surpressed!! See the documentary! And before you think it's just another "crazy nutty conspiracy theory", actually it's not, the documentary comes from a respectable source. Go check it out on Google or YouTube.
The upshot of all this is that you dont have to worry about climate change or greenhouse gas emissions anymore! Fly wherever you want to go and dont feel guilty!
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I am so angry that my license fee goes to paying for this kind of subliterate feature that contains a mix of poor science and unbalanced politics - and is dull with it. FFS BBC, this is supposed to be a news feature.
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@Bruno
I would then encourage people to watch 'the great global warming swindle' swindle which was shown on Australian tv. Unfortunately the only place I have found to watch this is by downloading it from thepriatebay. It reveals some of the misquotations in the original film as well as other interesting snippets. You do need to have watched the great global; warming swindle first though.
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there is an aspect to this issue of 'carbon footprints' that i've not seen discussed anywhere. regardless of 'climate change', it is relatively simple math that, for every molecule of CO2 which is formed, there is one less molecule of O2 free in the atmosphere. atmospheric CO2 has clearly been shown to be increasing. this would necessarily be at the expense of O2. biology 101 has it that most creatures, including humans, require O2 for their existence.
every time you burn something, be it wood in your fireplace, gasoline in your automobile or jet fuel, that's just so much oxygen which is no longer available for your own body's use.
even a slight diminishing of available O2 can have a significant adverse impact on human physical and psychological vitality.
something to think about it.
matt
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Most desire is mere illusion
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How refreshing to hear the skeptical view expounded in these pages! I live in the San Francisco Bay Area, where such comments would get one bounced from any arty cafe, pronto. To question Global Warming in these parts is heresy, akin to questioning the divinity of Jesus in front of a Southern Baptist.
I would be completely on-board with the green crowd if only they kept the argument simple: getting our energy by burning fossil fuels is crazy. It can't continue forever. Efficiency is good. Less is more.
But no, the argument has to take on a quasi-religious pomposity that makes everything we do wrong. Driving, flying, eating meat, shopping at WalMart - all heretical activities. In earlier days we used to burn people at the stake for such non-compliance.
My advice to the greens: Tone it down. Cut the hubris. And play the cards that you have, because we're calling your bluff.
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A quick youtube video which picks apart some of the problems with 'the great global warming swindle'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boj9ccV9htk
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All this is rather academic considering that oil is going to become scarce and expensive in the not to distant future
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Its never just that simple. The world infrastructure has been built around the fact we do fly. Think of all the third world places and islands who rely 100% on tourism. Business still needs flying. We can do so much on the internet but its not a substitute for being there. The future lies in developing technologies, more efficient fuels and maybe alternative means of powering jet engines. Hysterical " we all must stop flying" is not the answer. Many 100,000 of jobs will be lost. Airlines will cease to exist. Economies will suffer and more people will lose their livelyhoods.
We need to get away from this panic mongering and sit down and invest in development in a level headed manner. Nothing going to change overnight,. This is about a gradual changer from fossil fuels ( which will run out anyway) to alternative energy, more efficient and lower emission engines.
Everyone calm down. ( From one one very annoyed airline pilot).
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#6
Quote:-
Not exactly the big nasty of CO2 - but rather, something that forms a natural part of our environment, and something (H2O) that simply cannot be 'increased' by human factors.
Not sure if here is a hint of irony in your comment; but in actual fact if you remove all CO2 from the atmosphere we'd all be dead, virtually everything would be dead. Life, in its current form, cannot survive without CO2. The definition of organic chemistry is:- a discipline within chemistry that involves the scientific study of the structure, properties, composition, reactions, and preparation (by synthesis or by other means) of hydrocarbons and their derivatives. Hydrocarbons are compounds which contain Hydrogen and Carbon (and sometimes other elements).
By the way you breathe out air containing 40000ppm (parts per million), currently the accepted figure for "normal" atmospheric content is about 380ppm. If CO2 is declared a polutant (as in the USA) we'd all better watch out.
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Carbon offsetting is such a scam. It's the papal indulgence of the 21st century...
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There is only one way in which we will be able to continue the happily self-centred, competitive, way of life that we have evolved over many hundreds, if not thousands, of years. Reduce our population as fast as humanly possible. 2 billion would be a nice target.
Any population scientists like to put some numbers on how long we would need to settle for one child per person to get there?
No amount of tinkering with carbon levels, alternative energy sources, or genetically modified foods will get us past the problems we face in the next 50 years. They will all prove to be impossible to apply justly, counter-productive, or threaten our well-being in some way (the human attention span is way too short for nuclear power; and are we really smart enough to genetically out-think evolution?).
Reduce population. Everything else with prove to be just too complicated.
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For what it's worth:
@ Comment 6 - aviation-induced water vapour from contrails is responsible for cirrus cloud formation, which some scientists argue has a greater impact on climate change than CO2. I wouldn't really say that this water vapour is a "natural part of our environment"
@ Comment 27 - virtually no friction on an aircraft?! Lot's of friction is generated by the contact between the moving aircraft and surrounding air. In fact, this very contact, which generates skin friction drag makes up about 40% of the total aircraft drag...and high drag means high fuel burn.
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The other problem is that planes release their pollutants high up in the atmosphere where they have an even stronger greenhouse effect. The process is known as radiative forcing and means aircraft emissions are reckoned to be almost twice as damaging as emissions at ground level.
Where Ever did you get this from, there is no scientific evidence to support this.
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I think it's a bad idea to drop planes like they're something filthy right now. New technology is what will make them more efficient but no one will pour the amount of time, manpower or resources needed into a form of transportation that no one uses. After all, we wouldn't have the hybrid (at this point in time) if no one thought of the internal combustion engine first.
I think this is just one of those things where we have to be patient for the technology to catch up with what is needed (while still nudging to make sure that such projects are worked on).
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You ask me: "how do you illustrate, in a television report, the impact of flying on the environment?".
I answer: "you don't". Instead, you illustrate, in a television report, the impact on a television reporter of first finding that his plan to fly across the world infuriated his wife, enraged his colleagues and alienated a large section of his audience, apparently because they all came to belong to some sort of cult that believes that if a man exhales, a polar bear drowns, and then finding that this cult is all some gigantic hoax, tax scam and power game perpetrated on the gullible.
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As pointed out in an earlier post, the elephant in the room is the unsustainable global population. Now there's a taboo topic! The more people there are, the more of the earth's resources we burn and the more CO2 we produce. We really need action on all fronts if we are to solve our problems in a civilised way.
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I have no qualms about flying at all. One major point that nobody appears to cottoned onto is the fact that most people fly off to warmers climes. This being so means that! One is not using ones car at home and using public transport when abroad. The heating in your home is turned down. The lights are turned off, cooking is nonexistent. In my particular case my shop is closed. Therfore no heating or electric is being use. To sum up! I am only using the carbon that I save by not being at home. This applies to a great number of people who go abroad for there holidays. Therefore we should make flying cheaper and should encourage people to go abroad and lift all these stupid taxes. It could increase carbon emissions. Not reduce them
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@Justin
Why not look at the ethics of the Copenhagen Jamboree - with 20,000 delegates flying from all round the world staying in posh hotels, eating MEAT.
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It is generally accepted that her in the 21st century we have a few more factories, cars, trains and aircraft than were around in the 16th century. It is also generally accepted in the scientific community that temperatures in the 16th century were around three degrees higher than they are now. Yet this same community continues to push the idea that modern means of transport and manufacturing are the cause of "global warming".
The fact is that the climate has been changing cyclically ever since the Flood. It gets warm, it gets cold, it gets warm again. Big deal. It is NOT man-made.
We used to hear scare stories about the hole in the ozone layer. What they didn't tell you is that the "hole" was found by accident, we don't know how long it's been there, we don't know how big it should be, we don't know IF it should be there. By the way, it's been shrinking for the last few years.
The only truth behind the global warning myth is that governments are using it as an excuse to wring more taxes out us.
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Have they heard about video conferencing ?
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Justin
How did you get this job?
"is ethical to fly "? Get a Life !!!!!!!!!!!!!
Camshaft.
Dallas,Texas
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I think there are two reasonable steps that can be taken to reduce air travel emissions
1. Make sure people know the UK is an exciting and varied place. Our culture is obsessed with the idea that abroad is better, but few people ever think why. If I was an evil dictator I would make people sit an exam on places to visit in the UK to be allowed a passport for lesiure purposes. Advertise wonderful places that can be reached in a couple of hours on a car or train. The Isles of Scilly are nothing like what you expect England to be, and the tropical rainforsts I've been to weren't that different from large British woodlands.
2. Fly a few large planes instead of lots of small ones. Look at flights between Geneva and London. There are probably about 20 a day, all of those on fairly small, inefficient planes! Some routes can only justify small planes, but not Geneva-London, and there must be other similarly popular ones. I believe the problem is that Geneva's runway isn't long enough to take the big planes, and any talk of extending airports tends to get a negative knee jerk reaction from environmental groups, but I think it would be worth trying to convince them.
But well done on a realistic and well balanced article. I am a little fed up of some (not all) of the eco-brigade making totally unreasonable demands in a needless agressive way (such as telling me I must not fly ever, despite all my family and my boyfriend living in another country) which is more likely to make people think reducing emissions from air travel is too unreasonable to bother with than look for ways in which it can be done.
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I feel sorry for your "Ethical Man" as he frets and worries about his flight to Jamaica. He should just look at what is going on in Copenhagen where supplies of limousines for delegates to the climate change conference are so short that they are having to be driven in from Germany.
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You've convinced me.
I'm going to cancel my foreign holiday and fly to Copenhagen to eat lobster.
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One solution is heavier-than-air flight (i.e. Zeppelins). Zeppelins fly at half the speed, but a fraction of the carbon impact. So you'll be in the Caribbean after a day's flight instead of half a day's flight, but in a more comfortable environment. Instead of arriving in the evening and going straight to bed, you arrive in the morning rested (and one fewer nights on the hotel tab).
For tourism and freight, heavier-than-air flight is a total waste of carbon.
Sincerely,
Dr. Jürg Gassmann
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What are you blathering on about?
"...much (not all) time spent travelling is time not spent doing something else - often a productive activity. So there is an economic cost to slow travel."
Productive/economic activities are not inherently good, in fact, are quite likely to be bad for the environment. I'm not saying flying is good, but that doing nothing is often better than doing something productive as productive activities usually mean burning oil/exploiting third world in some way.
So, in the above argument, you're saying "sod the environment, I need to burn oil to move fast, otherwise there'll be an economic price to pay", which is a strange thing for an ethical person to say.
I agree with the chap who stated that desire is an illusion. He's right. Compassion is the way forward - compassion for humans and the planet. What is truly right for us humans is truly right for the planet and all that live on it. Think on and think deeply.
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Taxes, we have so many of them anyway and so much is wasted (bailing out banks, paying compensation for civil servants incompetence etc.) and also without digressing too into another huge debate the whole nuclear program coupled in party to that of the military.
Nuclear, supposedly the big saviour of the earth its 'no co2 emissions and no pollution a marvel. except when you look back at where it comes from, what happens to the ore. Although plutonium uranium and the like are very energy rich fuels huge amounts of ore are needed to be refined to make it into a suitable grade for power stations, which in turn let it be used in nuclear weapons (research it if you like).
This refining process, energy intensive, powered by fossil fuels, producing emissions etc. isn't the answer. Also the transport of the refined product, or the ore to the refinery or the waste from the plant aren't taken into consideration of this no co2 emissions.
The land it is mined from, huge areas of generally western Europe are obliterated for large scale open cast style mining, villages and people moved then the land left abandoned and inhabitable. The appalling wages of the people who are down the mines, exposed to radiation, working long hours.
And thats without going into what happens to the nuclear waste once its reacted.
So with so much clearly wrong with nuclear why is the government planning to 'invest' so much money (£3.7billion on sizewell B just to install) to it when it could be spent developing cheaper technologies which actually have a pay back time instead of a lifespan.
Wind is too unreliable? well maybe the fact that others controlling the raw resources for our power, or them running out, or maybe them just getting too expensive to be economically viable? is that really more reliable?
Furthermore with the energy gap at the moment and nuclear power station taking at least 10 years to build they aren't a quick solution either
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Just wonderin' 'bout my
comment earlier.Did it make the cut?
Camshaft
Dallas,Texas
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How about we look at if climate change is indeed happening and if it is man made?
I seriously considered it, until I read the hacked climate scientists e-mails and realized we have been played like pawns in a climate change racket...why? For power over our lives and for higher taxes.
That's all this climate change non-sense it about.
Sorry Mr. Rowlatt, you just wasted a year of your life. So take that plane, relax and know you are doing nothing to detroy the enviroment. I'm all for being clean, but green (all based of false premises, no thanks).
To me, as a historian, this all seems so medival and in the future people will wonder what got into sane people to give their lives to an empty cause.
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Re my earlier post (#81) - Zeppelins are LIGHTER-than-air, traditional jets are heavier-than-air. Zeppelins are the once and future mode of transport. Apologies.
Dr. Jürg Gassmann
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I always had a problem with this blog that it considers environmentalism as the only ethical imperative.
As a smarter American than me once put it, "Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness." Cheap (in money and time) travel brings the world together. If we suddenly decide that bicycles are the only way to travel, people will cease to remember that there are people other than those in front of them.
A "small world" brings the problems of how the other three-quarters lives to our doorsteps, and makes visits to other countries not an exclusive activity of military forces.
The question is: what is good for humanity as a whole. If we lose some farmland and some vacation homes sink into the sea and avoid World War III and give starving kids in the third world a little bit of information on how to avoid beriberi, I'm okay with that!
Honest stewardship of the environment for future generations is definitely part of our ethical obligations, but "carbon is the only and ultimate evil" just doesn't fly.
(irony intended)
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If David Attenborough can clock up the air miles, I'm pretty sure it's ok for me to do it!
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This is very simple. People with the wealth to fly claim it is their 'human right' to demand low cost holidays at the expense of hundreds of millions of other, generally, poorer people who depending on where they live face drought, flooding or economic ruin. As John Lydon wrote back in 1976 - cheap holidays in other peoples miseries'.
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My carbon footprint: 36 years & i've never been on an airplane or driven a car.
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There is no solution to the environmental impact of flying. Unfortunately we can't do it any more. With immediate effect aviation fuels should carry tax (there's no tax on it at the moment). As a result of the tax the cost of flying will increase dramatically. As a result of the cost increasing there will be fewer passengers to provide the income for airlines and in turn that will increase the cost of operating aircraft. Higher cost of operating aircraft will push up the price of tickets even further and within a short time flying will virtually cease.
Unfortunately that's the way it has to be. The world will be a better place for it.
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At the risk of sounding selfish, I've ridden, run or walked to work every day for the last 2 years, even after a 4' snowstorm and in -30C, so I've earned the right to fly compared to 99% percent of those same people I see sitting in traffic every day.
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@muadip2: I've already given up flying - I don't think it's something we have to wait for others to do, but just set the example ourselves. I've noticed that it sets people thinking when they ask me why I'm holidaying in Norfolk or somesuch. No point laying a guilt trip, just explaining my reasoning is enough.
I remember when I gave up owning a car (20 years ago now); from year to year I'd wonder if I could manage another year without (especially come the winter). Now it's just second nature, and feels quite liberating, strangely. I think the same thing will happen when we just shut the door on our own choice to fly.
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I norice with amusement, but without surprise, that the thousands of "evnironmentalists", politicians, bureaucrats & lobbyists FLEW to Copenhagen. If they actually believed the HOT AIR that they emit when they make speeches on "climate change", they would have avoided generating all this CO2 by holding a teleconference.
It seems more plausible that they want OTHERS to have a lower standard of living, so that these members of today's nomenkultura can continue to live a luxurious life at OUR expense.
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Pollution of the atmosphere is worldwide and from many sources. From the burning of rain forests and the many aircraft flying, the assorted range of vehicles, every living human and animal passes flatulence. Landfill sites burn vast amounts of rubbish, the huge vehicle tyre mountains that burn for ever. Industrial air pollution is rife in parts of Europe and in the Far East. So sadly I see us having little chance of controlling so many pollutants that contaminate the air we breathe.
In this age of Technology we can do so much, but we cannot visualise that
air pollution needs a worldwide concerted effort.
Power stations are quickly erected as and when needed. A new industry needs developing that could be produced worldwide .....atmospheric
cleaners. These could be similar size to power station. Basically the
idea is they suck in polluted air [From HOTSPOTS ] and blow out cleaned air.
The same principle be adopted but airborne cleaners on airships to fly ove cities like the Goodyear balloon Other ideas can be adopted I am sure. Yes I know its seems not practicle, to expensive, laughable. So was Flying to the moon and a 101 other inventions. We have to tackle this from a different perspective with everyone helping. Someone first
of all try it on a small scale, see what the effect is.
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Why are we so concerned about climate change yet at the same time renewing our nuclear weapons systems. A weapons system at would polute if not distroy the world for ever in a matter of minutes. Yet they are worried about me flying to an holiday destination once a year, all seems very strange to me.
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Zeppelins had gotten a bad rap in the olden days, but the technology is much safer now and much cleaner. They're spacier, fly lower (with a great view), probably fit much more people and could offer a great new avenue to explore. Why doesn't the EU study this possibility and set a precedent for the rest of the world? So what if they're slower, it's a small price to pay if it helps clean up the planet. I bet they're safer now than jet airplanes. Plus with on-board entertainment, cell phones and wireless internet, it could be more like a cruise-ship. It's about time we think outside the box...
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This is ridiculous. ClimateGate should have exposed to everyone that the idea of anthropogenic global warming is nothing other than an attempt to establish a sort of Guilt Church State Religion. Carbon is sin, and carbon credits are indulgences.
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I recently did a carbon footprint test on the internet and as a result I have concluded that the entire climate change problem is intractable.
I found that I would have to reduce my trips (by air) to Canada from once a year to once every three or four years, even though all my relatives live there (I immigrated to the UK from Canada many years ago). I would also have to reduce my trips around Europe from 10 or so to around 2 a year. And I would still be only part way to meeting the requirements for an acceptable carbon footprint set by that particular test.
Add to the above, the fact that Americans will never, ever, accept restrictions on their use of cars that would enable them to make substantial reductions in emissions, even if the very laid-out design of their cities allowed them to do so.
The only way I can see this working is if we all accept the "one child one family" concept adopted by the Chinese many years ago, and enforce it for centuries. But would that be politically acceptable in the west?
Maybe we should just give up now, or give more thought to the potential technical solutions that were canvassed in a recent BBC feature?
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Seeing as I've just read the article from my hotel room in Madrid, having just flown in from London, I think my views should be clear. Do I think we should give up holidays? No.
Do I think there should be aviation expansion to allow aircraft to operate to their best ability? Yes.
Flying Matters - and I for one won't stop flying.
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Great news! now my 20 year old Land Rover is more efficient than a Prius! How? With all 11 seats filled its 30mpg works out to be a frugal 0.81 litres/100 km per person.
I shall write to Mr Brown immediately to demand a reduction in my car tax.
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Post 6. (marek chodnik) wrote:
"What nonsense ... As detailed in a recent BBC report, climate change sceptic scientists have asserted that 98% of greenhouse gas is... water vapour ..."
--------
Being scientifically trained I couldn't agree with you more ... e.g. take a look at my own post http://poweromics.blogspot.com/2009/07/more-spin-than-science.html for instance ...
... and if you think the BBC are about to change tack in terms of proper unbiased journalistic reporting (e.g. on Climate Change) I think you need to read this too ...
http://poweromics.blogspot.com/2009/09/bbc-part-of-conspiracy-preventing.html
'ethical man' ? ... more like 'milking' the 'climate change gravy train' (and avoiding any proper journalism) ...
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By far the biggest threat to the world's ecology and climate, leading to climatic catastrophe in the future, is global human population. In a nutshell, it is not just what we are doing as human beings consuming resources, it is also how many of us there are on the planet doing it. Also, the more the world's human population increases, the more conflicts there will be, and war and militarism is a huge contributor to global warming through consumption of resources. One huge contribution to reducing consumption that people can make is to restrict the number of children they have, then the human population expansion will begin to fall as older people die off. It will be a bitter pill to take, but population reduction is the only way to reduce the amount of natural resources being consumed.
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There is a very simple solution to this. Limit every person, by law, to a certain number of air-miles each year. Using economic methods to deal with this simply prices out the poorest people who fly - the ones who save years for their one special holiday - while doing little to dissuade those who are wealthy to fly as often as they like. Entrenching and exacerbating economic inequality will do little to encourage people to make this an "ethical" issue. So - limit everyone to a certain number of air miles each year. Make them tradeable. Require those wealthy enough to travel often to pay those who will never be able to fly for the privilege.
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Being trapped in Australia doesn't quite appeal - Selfish yes. But it is proven that the Beef industry contributes more environmental damage than car driving does. So when the majority of the population began taking vegetarianism seriously maybe I'll start cutting down on flights.
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Surely the world is out there to be seen? Why shouldnt we get out there and see it? The cheapest way to do this of course is to fly. I think there is definitely an arguement against the heavy use of aviation as a form of transport, particularly business users. The latest statistic is that, at any one time, there are appromimately 35,00 mepole in the air around the world! Thats a lot, and, around 20% of these are business users who could be in meeting via video link without ever needing to leave their offices.
I sincerely hope that holiday revenue passengers dont end up paying through the nose on eco taxes because of some unnecessary travelling. The UK is a beautiful part of the world but there is so, so much more; and why shouldnt we go out there and see it??
Developing areas of the world such as China and Indonesia are churning vast amounts of gases into the atmospere, producing items for our everyday convenience. These are the places that should be paying attention to their outputs. Im sure that commercial aviation pales in significance to these countries emissions.
Isnt it time that we as a planet got our heads together and agreed to reduce all forms of waste emissions for the common good?
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Carbon emissions trading. How is this fixing anything and where is it going socially? Economists will be delirious to find we are very happy to ease our consciences by paying for breathable air. When we boil it down, that's what it is. The little person's money (not government, not major polluters) paying largely unregulated businesses for cleaner behaviour. That's exactly where they want us to go - "you want natural areas - you pay for em. You want drinkable water - you pay for it. You want a livable planet - ditto." What's next? You want human rights - pay for em? Oh that's right, we surrendered that one a long time ago. And it seems we'll pay these non-representative profit-minded 'emission-cutters' happily so long as we can take fewer days off work and get to our destinations faster. We're being played again, people.
This report, by the way, is absurd and childish. Light-bulb junket to Jamaica? I agree with the missus - ethical man is a farce, and the appropriate time for this style of reporting has passed.
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Do people from the UK really take one foreign vacation a year? I guess it's a small country, but that seems like a lot! I only fly once every few years, but I believe that this is on the high end for the USA.
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If airlines were made to pay the full costs, including environmental costs, of their operations, and passed those costs along to ticket buyers, the volume of travel would diminish dramatically. Nonessential flight is feasible today for most people in most countries only because of large implicit and explicit public and environmental subsidies. We don't even need punitive taxes, just let the market do its job.
Personally, I haven't found it necessary to venture more than a few hundred km to find relaxation, but if someone needs to go to Fiji, and can reimburse the earth in full for the pleasure, let him have at it.
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If politicians are wondering why they get totally slaughtered every time they try and stop us flying then this is why. Most people are lucky to go on a flight once a year, and this is a relatively short journey, mostly to Spain and other parts of Europe due to the cheap flight culture. Then politicians who would just go out to Iraq for a simple photo opportunity or a meeting that can be done via web cam (David Cameron take note)in their private jet then telling us we can't fly once year, when they fly about 30 times a year, as we are damaging the atmosphere.
They criticize us even though we share it with hundreds of other passengers being treated similar to cattle, especially those of us on smaller incomes. This mean s our fuel efficiency is a lot better than those hypocrites in their private jets. Furthermore you have celebrities who will fly on a whim. After all, Simon Cowell must fly hundreds and thousands of miles when he goes between America and England most weeks, and he's not even in a minority of celebs who do this. Do we hear politicians ranting at them, no we don't. In their private jet; your two litre petrol Saab 9-5 estate and our packed out cattle planes look solar panel like next to them. Business men are the same, constantly jet setting to clinch the latest deal. Yet politicians and climate activists want us to stop what many people call this once a year holiday culture, why are we the ones to blame for wanting to visit new lands when the rich people get to do it multiple times a year?
I would also like to mention why your advert was fundamentally flawed. Not only do most people not go as far as Jamaica, but they mainly go to Europe which is a fraction of the distance you did! Not only that, but they go to relax and return more able to contribute better to society, not for the sake of it to prove a point!
As a final point I will say this: I have been with my Canadian partner for 3 and a half years now, and at times, one of us has to sacrifice seeing their close family for months on end. We are lucky if we get to see them once a year, flying is the only way to travel 3500 miles over the ocean. What I cannot understand is how politicians like yourself can sit there and say we should fly less. You are seriously advocating we should see our close family less than once a year? When you can go of to Jamaica just to make a point, and politicians sit there after their tenth flying trip that month and say we should fly less; not see our family as much, as we would be contributing to the damage in the atmosphere stinks of hypocrisy of the highest order. Why can't climate advocates, or ethical claimants such as yourself, encourage politicians to spend more time outlawing older jet engines that aren't very fuel efficient and spend less time making us feel guilty for occasionally seeing our close family??
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I don't think these people realize the effects taxes like the ones proposed would have on the airline industry, i'm in my second year at the University of Western Ontario in Commercial Aviation Management and for me and everyone else in my program that would be disastrous. The economics effects for the airline industry and those employed by them would be terrible, and i'm trying to keep this as civilized as possible.
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one of the arguments I hear against emissions reduction is the economic impact. Isn't that short-term thinking? What is the point of saving jobs and keeping the economy chugging along if the end game is loss of everything? In the words of Bart Simpson, "duh".
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I believe a problem lies with "Low Cost Airlines" in that they encourage people to make completely un-necessary "impluse" journeys - i.e. plane loads of Britons flying to Slovakia for a booze-up or Prague for a Stag Night. I disagree that business travellers are the problem, since in most cases their journeys do contribute significantly to the economy and employment. Booze ups in Bratislava may give jobs to bar keepers but their object could be easily achieved within a couple of miles of the passengers' homes. Low cost airlines in most cases do have modern, efficient aircraft, but they now account for SEVERAL HUNDRED EXTRA aircraft plying the European skies every day, They are only filled up by encouraging more and more people to make flights they did without in the past. Long haul flying is not likely to be impulse - "lets go to Sydney for the weekend". I therefore think there is a case for putting a hefty tax on short haul flying to make all of us think twice about junkets. Perhaps a "free" ration of one round trip short haul per person per year, any more to be taxed?
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Forget taxes and those people that wish to take your money and your freedom by man made things for man made things.
Don't worry be happy, as I understand it no one gets out alive. :-)
http://homepages.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~texdick/ [Unsuitable/Broken URL removed by Moderator]
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Absolute trollop
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Flying is likely the most ethical way to travel , even more so than walking. It is a form of mass transit, and the infrastructure for it is very centralized in hubs. Very little habitat must be sacrificed for airports, and aside from the possibility that CO2 has a negative environmental impact, aircraft never touch the ground outside of an airport.
If we consider travel by road, rail, or sea we should look beyond CO2 to the wider environmental impact. As a Canadian raised in the interior of my nation I have seen new roads and rails punched in to virgin forest to extract the resources. Soon this access allows humans to utilize these areas in other ways that only continue to have a negative impact on the environment.
Flying is by far the most ethical way to travel as it keeps people out of the habitat that they would otherwise foul in their journey through it.
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It's easy to take potshots at flying to eco-events or argue about this or that technology, conspiracy or sense of guilt or entitlement, but there is a very large creature in the room that no one seems to have noticed. It is not my intention to stifle anyone's efforts at reducing our individual carbon footprints (everything from eating less meat to having fewer children), but all of our personal "footprints" put together are completely lost within the Godzilla-print of the world's militaries. Put into perspective, how many energy saving lightbulbs does it take to offset all the planes, ships and other vehicles not only on missions of war, but on "routine" training and patrol, or just moving stuff and people around? And even if governments were to "offset" some of this, they'd just make the taxpayers bear it in the end, doubtless through debt spending, just like they finance their militaries in the first place.
Many might say, as with disarmament, "we could stand down if 'they' stand down first." This is an unsupportable dodge. Every human concerned about climate change must demand their own government unilaterally and unconditionally reduce and confine their militaries to home defense only. From within the biggest empire of all, I call out the US government first and foremost on the planet on this question, with its globe-spanning network of bases aimed at control of oil and other resources, its occupations, "full court presses," not-so-secret wars and wargames, and arming of its favored allies around the world. Its military budget is bigger than most or all of the rest of the planet combined, and I'm sure its carbon footprint is even worse. End the "carbon bleeding" from this gushing wound, and then we can assess and reduce the damage from the minor scrapes of individuals' footprints ethically and in peace. Not to mention being far better able to afford it.
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What else to do but fly. Trains and ships take too long in our fast paced world. Can you imagine taking a sailing vessel. We are not sure exactly when we will arrive. The express packet usually makes New York, USA in a week but sometimes it takes two. An ethical world has a much lower population than present. A population that doesn't move about, has no air conditioning, little heat, eats mostly vegetables with a little chicken once a week and doesn't bath more than twice in a week. Oh well curse me for a sinner.
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It's the frequent flying that's the problem, I think. What we need is LONGER holidays and fewer of them. We need to be able to save up annual leave for a few years and take it all at once, and spend months away instead of weeks. Really get to know a place. Travel around on the ground. Make a few friends. Learn a bit of the language. Save money on the plane flights we didn't take.
And in between long-distance trips, what about having a local holiday?
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The airline industry and aerospace firms Boeing and Airbus are tackling this tough issue. They have promoted the use of jet fuel which is derived from algae and other plant forms which absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, so by the time they harvest the oil and burn it, the plants would have offset that amount, creating a carbon neutral cycle, all without competing with the food sources which drive up food cost. A 747 recently flew with engines running off such a fuel, proving the technology exists. Currently both airframers and airlines are investing in the technology and should be replacing 50% of all jet A1 fuel with said biofuels in the next 5-7 years.
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Having just perused the above posts, I begin to wonder how my carbon footprint is? I haven't owned a car for 26 years (my concern was the petrol even back then) but now I fly to Europe (from Australia) twice a year. I have been doing that for the past 3 years. Unfortunately with a girlfriend 16,000 km this is the only possible solution for us at the moment. So that makes 64,000 km per year.
Then again I have to think that those flights I take are going to take off with me on board or not.
Finally no doubt some of you have noticed that we have a heretic here in Australia.
http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/beware-the-climate-of-conformity-20090412-a3ya.html?page=-1
This is certainly food for thought.
After all, politically, global warming is the 1984 Orwellian equivalent of ongoing war. None of it will happen in the lives of our current politicians...
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Has anyone here considered the positve impact on carbon footprints of long haul travel?
Sure - I could drive somewhere local and have a holiday - spending time in far flung, often developing world destinations inevitably means a low-carbon footprint.
A holiday trekking in the Andes, on safari in Kenya or lounging around on a sandy island in the Phillippines will almost certainly see you eating locally produced food, consuming very little energy on heating or cooling and NOT wasting energy.
By contrast staying at home in the guise of being 'ecologically responsible' will likely see us burning energy on heating or cooling, eating food grown all over the planet and using any number of high power gadgets to keep us entertained.
How long does an overseas holiday have to be before the carbon effect of the airtravel is neutralised by the carbon effect of being outside of the developed world?
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A question of detail: I would expect planes to use considerably more energy when taking off than when cruising at high altitude. If I am right, short haul journeys are rather more inefficient than long haul. A further reason to discourage short haul flying.
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By not having children, I'm doing my part. Over three generations, children and their offspring in Briton would be producing 54t of c02 per year. That's assuming averages of course. I'll be taking my flight now, and sleeping well at night.
And regarding flight in the UK, the CAA is doing everything possible to slow the acceptance of alternative fuels into the pipeline. Costs and time of getting certification are outrageously high preventing smaller companies from bringing in novel solutions. On the one hand, government is fighting tooth and nail to get you to feel guilty about flying, and on the other, they are trying to make it as difficult as possible to actually fix the problem. That's how I would run a tax scam.
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All this hot air about global warming aka climate change reminds me of a group of fleas on a dogs back arguing over which flea owns the dog. Old ma nature has a self regulating system that has worked for several millenniums in that when temps rise ice melts, oceans expand and reflect more sunlight back into space thus cooling the planet. We are entering another ice age and the past ten years have shown a decided cooling trend. The lobotomized liberals in the media and politics want to control more and more of our lives and carbon credits is one way to do that. All the little third world coutries are worried about their finances, as they should be due to their corrupt leaderships. Don't worry about global warming. Worry about being hit by an asteroid.
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Since everyone who can afford it likes to keep on flying while they can, how about turning things around on a smaller scale by making vegetarian dishes on planes the standard meal? People could still opt to be served meat, but they'd have to specifically ask for it when buying their ticket. It would literally give the aviation industry a greener image, plus hopefully make people think, and not just consume.
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You want to solve the problem? Three words: Realistic carbon tax.
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Still think personal carbon budgets are the way forward. If 5 tonnes each a year is (just about) sustainable, people can make their own choices about how to 'spend' theirs- after energy saving in the home and reconsidering travel choices it would be a natural limit on how many long-haul jaunts one would take just for fun. I'd exclude business trips.
Jamaica was a good idea- people still have some sort of cognitive dissonance about understanding how their actions contribute to climate change- they can simultaneously care about it and put it out of their mind when planning a holiday. If you think that adults are defined by taking responsibility for the consequences of their behaviour, then you probably find people who refuse to wrestles with this issue rather lame. Pointing out the consequences has to be a good thing, although of course some people really do only care about themselves.
I think this abdication of personal responsibility underpins much of the climate change deniers' motives, given the mish-mash of justifications ranging from false claims about scientific consensus to tax conspiracy theories to the persecution of Copernicus.
Tell you what would be a great blog post- debunking the nonsense on these message threads from flat-earthers determined to ignore scientific consensus, even though its recommendations dovetail with sound energy policy anyway. In this case, there are no extra costs associated with the precautionary principle as we've been arsing about with energy policy for the past 30 years ensuring a cheap, temporary supply rather than building long term, secure methods of energy generation.
For goodness sake let's just get on with it.
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Now can we have a report about all the private jets that a flying the delegates to the Copenhagen conference? Not to mention the 1,200 limos that they have ordered - so far.
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Climate change is an intractable dilemma, especially as the world population growth is exponential and even in the poorest of countries the aspirations are to emulate the 'Big American Dream'.
In many ways, successive governments have created problems by their insistence on the use of creative accountancy methods to massage balance sheets for political gain, the result often being perceived as financial gain in one area simply being one moved as a problem onto another sector, often with disadvantageous sociological results. One could cite many example, but two of the most obvious which directly affects most families is the closure of smaller local schools and hospitals in the interest of "financial efficiencies". That not only results in thousands of otherwise quite unnecessary journeys, usually by private car, taxi or ambulance, but it also rips the heart of any community so afflicted. It adds to the length of 'working' days and there are the additional burdens of frustration and stress with which to contend, not to mention the reduction in quality time one can invest in one's family and the extra work burden frequently imposed because a second car becomes an essential acquisition, especially where school runs are involved. Of course, local and central governments will justify such actions by publishing their miraculous financial results, but no measure is offered on the negative environmental effects or the social divisiveness of these fabulous and fallacious accountancy expediencies.
If I may offer local experiences from rural France as examples. This country is now littered with small towns and villages with derelict properties and heartless communities because the very essence of the original communities has been destroyed, simply because of an obsession with 'big is beautiful'. Where we live, we also still have (just about) a potentially fine hospital which could serve all of the surrounding communities perfectly, apart from the most complex of procedures. However, we have the crazy situation of people having to drive over 30 miles to the district main city hospital even for the most mundane of needs. Often, those journeys are made either in private cars or in privately owned ambulance/sitting cars with just one occupant, and the driver cannot wait for the patient for a return journey. So they shuttle back and forth at break-neck speeds from six or seven in the morning until late evening, half of the time with just the driver on board. It has to be pointed out that public transport is almost non-existent in France apart from city centres and where it does exist it is all but useless for practical purposes. And yet, the French government is to introduce a hydrocarbon fuel surtax, on both domestic and vehicle fuels, to encourage us to use less and to drive less and has also now added a half Euro tax upon electric goods for their end-of-life disposal, both of these being additional to the existing 19.6% VAT. If that is not creative accountancy, what is?
We are being hoodwinked by technically and financially ignorant politicians who cannot envisage anything beyond the next set of elections and dull-witted accountants who cannot perceive anything beyond the date of their next set of financial reports, which may be tomorrow!
We all need to accept a complete lifestyle change, including a change to our holidaying habits. Yes the average car is comparatively inefficient with just one occupant, but as a mode of transport for just two, one does not need to be an economics genius to work out how the carbon emissions are halved and as a family transport system for, say four, it becomes tolerably acceptable. Of course, one cannot drive to the 'States' or SE Asia, but we need to begin to realise that those days of travel need to be made a thing of the past. Similarly, business travel need to be curtailed. We were told the great computer revolution would virtually eliminate a need to travel the globe on business but the converse has occurred. In truth, much business travel has become a heavily subsidised 'jolly' for a privileged elite and that is absolute nonsense and must be curtailed. I can already hear the screams of anguish from the vested interests and governments who have mindsets which are devoid of any meaningful alternatives to generate useful employment and necessary revenue.
The major problem ,and this applies all over the world, is that the economic model we have used for the past century or more has run its course. It needs drastic change but there is no government on this planet that has the courage or moral fibre to go down that route. We are obsessed with economic growth and that is not just poisoning our planet with carbon emissions, it is also destroying our environment to satisfy the 'insatiable'. Apart from the effects upon ourselves, that is also effectively destroying that very natural world around us that we so much adore to watch on out TV screens and then aspire to visit 'to see for ourselves'. It is a mindset we have and I cannot believe that can be changed as long as we have politicians who lead politically blinkered existences and who will only take notice of the often manipulated, mendacious information with which they are fed by vested interests.
I reiterate, this is an intractable issue and I doubt we can provide any meaningful solutions without a complete change in the way we view the perceived' essentials' of life, plus some concerted policies towards eventual population limitations.
As a footnote, one may ask what the carbon footprint may be of the thousands of attendees at the Copenhagen Summit, especially if one adds that to the carbon footprints associated with all of the other 'Summits' which have take place in recent weeks. Also, what will be the Presidents Obama's 'footprint' for his intended visit to Copenhagen, no doubt in 'Air-force One'
Of course, I completely forgot. It is not me that causes any damage , it's the other fella!
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Justin!
Give up the day job as you cannot see the truth staring you in the face.
CO2 is not a poison. CO2 at levels we encounter is keeping us and all vegetation alive!
Our [all mankind's] total CO2 contribution is about 3.8%. A hairs thickness in a kilometer high planetary blanket of atmosphere.
Ethical Man is to be renamed Pathetical Man IMHO.
The Scam of the Century is being played out in No Hopenhagen. Don't be a Lemming Justin!
If you want to do something useful, do an article on how wasteful and unproductive and expensive Wind Power generation is and always will be. Blots on every landscape on which they appear. Taxpayers money down the drain from day 1. So much for renewables.
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Dear Justin / Moderator, I am a researcher in Air Traffic Control and am interested in calculating fuel consumption for air journeys. I have written a model for the Crichton Centre, Glasgow that can calculate fairly accurate (10%) fuel consumption for a specific journey using very simple parameters. There is no such thing as an average aeroplane but I can list the factors that influence the result if you wish. BA fly direct to Kingston. The great circle distance is 4072 nautical miles. That's 15,083 km but your flight almost certainly burnt at least 4% more fuel than necessary. Probably 12% more. The BA flight timetable shows 10h10m on a B777. The optimum one-way flight with 300 passengers and no winds would have taken 8h 38m from take-off to touchdown and would have cost each passenger 206.6kg of fuel brakes-off to brakes-on. It is likely that up to 25 tonnes of cargo was carried too. That puts up the cost per person to 219.3kg. How much did your carbon footprint analyst allow? Who paid for the cargo? If you would like to explore further I would be glad to hear from you. The BBC has my email id and address.
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globalclaptrap: Arsenic is also not a poison - in very very small quantities.
Increasing the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere is the symptom of our excesses - our wastage of the resources of the planet and greed to make money from them. Hydrocarbons are non-renewable resources. At present we are recklessly wasting them to satisfy our 'wants' when we should be conserving them to meet our 'needs'.
Reduce, reuse, recycle should apply to fuel, just as people now recognise that it applies to paper, glass and so on. In this sense, increasing tax on fuel is analagous to the UK's landfill tax which in general has been very effective.
However, I think any form of direct of indirect tax on fuel / CO2 has to be spent directly and transparently on energy efficiency measures. The money must not disappear into a general pot as this will only reinforce the cynics' case.
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@68, Interestingly, the water vapour in the contrails, may well reduce global warming locally... http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/08/020808075457.htm although the opportunity to observe this has only happened once.
Why don't we weigh people and their luggage? We used to do it in the 1930s. We should take it one step further and force all airlines to do it, or perhaps implement it as some sort of weight tax to offset the CO2, based on weight. Why should my 60kg girlfriend pay the same as 89kg me? If the plane was full of 60kg people, then it would use a lot less fuel than a plane full of 89kg people. Make luggage pay by weight too... Most companies allow up to 25kg of luggage per person. Get rid of that and make it £1 per kilo.
Or the other option is to allow the seats to slide forward so you can get more small people on a plane than large people, optimising space. When you buy your tickets you enter your weight, height and predicted luggage weight, they then allocate a seat based on these specs and the plane can then run more efficiently.
It sounds horrible, but are low cost airlines that much better? It also puts the emphasis on large people to shift their weight!
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I was reading a Sunday magazine that went into the various ways of saving the planet. The superb Richard Branson is pioneering biofuels to be used in 747's. It's first flight was back in February last year. He's even researching Algae-Based Biofuels for his impressive Virgin Galactic operation.
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Since the first IPCC report in 1999 the jury has been out concerning cirrus (ice) cloud and aviation. A recent paper from the Max Planck Institute quotes a forcing of between 25 and 50 Watts per square meter for cirrus. By 2100, if we survive that long, doubling of CO2 will still only be making 3.5 Watts per square meter! Meanwhile cirrus cloud closes the infrared window and so prevents the earth’s surface radiating directly into space. Aviation emissions of H2O into the stratosphere already exceed all natural sources and so can double the cirrus coverage from 30% to 60%. Because of this the heat of the Gulf Stream is transported further north melting the ice cap and permafrost. Methane escapes from the permafrost and will reach the stratosphere where it is turned into more H2O by action of sunlight. There will be no turning back from this positive feedback. Best to keep your families small!
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Environmentalists never seem to have solutions that don't involve curbing our livestyles, freezing in our own homes, cycling to work or converting out third bedroom into an allotment.
The sad thing is there is a solution, which compared to the GDP of the world is receiving a tiny amount of funding. It's nuclear fusion and it's the silver bullet of environmentalism. Crack nuclear fusion and all this waffle about CO2 goes away.
So I suggest, take all the money that's currently pumped into environmental groups/projects, funding labs to create climate models and money spent giving journalists foreign holidays on the pretext of making a point and funnel it all into fusion research.
That way we can finally put all this drivel to bed.
I say that, but we won't really. Our environmentalist chums won't rest until we're living in caves and eating grass, but at least we won't have to hear any more about carbon footprints.
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Mr. Rowlatt,
Jetting away for holidays are best avoided by looking for a coastal holiday spot close to London and taking the bus getting there. In the line of work, if hard pressed, I suppose jetting would be fine. But do keep the footprint small.
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I think your title should be changed from Ethical Man to Politically Correct Man. Your attempt at being 'ethical' is saying that its somehow wrong to do anything other than agree with what ever you are saying because to do otherwise would be unethical, yet another form of control politics.
If we take your posting to its extreme (something a lot of climate change activists seem to do) then the only ethical thing to do would be to live in our mud huts with no electricity, no travel, and work at subsistance farming while living on a vegan diet because farm animals produce too much green house gas.
I used to be firmly in favor of action but I have to say I'm totally burned out on all this, burned out and fed up with all the lies and power and control politics from every side. So, I'm going to live my life as I want to and to hell with you all.
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It is interesting that the response from the sceptics is always an extreme view. No-one is suggesting that they have to live in caves!! What we really want you to do is stop wasting resources. Please don't leave the tap running or fill the kettle to the brim, or drive to work if you can walk, or jet off to New York on business if you can use the phone etc etc. We are really asking you to THINK, be considerate, not be greedy. Is that really so unreasonable? What's more, all of the above save you money which, if you don't want, you could give to charity!
Also, being green does not necessarily mean that you are 'losing' anything. It is just a different way of doing things. For example, if you go to work on the bus you can read the paper, make friends with the other passengers, listen to music or sleep. You can do none of these things in a car, even if you are stuck in a jam.
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Just like there's work being done on green petrol for cars, there's work being done on green jet fuel. It's unrealistic to hope for radical changes. We need to keep nudging the right way and quit saying 'it's not enough'. My personal unethical peeve is churches that flood light their steeples all night.
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@Richard,
You missed this plus point off of your list:
Being green gives you a lovely smug sanctimonious feeling - moral superiority while you scold your neighbors.
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@Richard,
The problem is that there are extremists on both sides. There are definitely groups that are advocating that we must abandon our entire way of life to stop increases in C02 and that any further emission of C02 is a mortal sin.
It'd be nice if news organizations would ignore these people, since their apocalyptic death cult worldview is what causes the knee-jerk defensive response in sensible people. Sadly, apocalyptic death cults backed by science make for great headlines, even if the science can't even begin to support or reject the more drastic claims that are made.
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Re #81;
Commercial jetliners fly faster than 1000 KM/hr.
Zeppelins will be grounded in a 100 km/hr wind, but even so, couldn't do 200 km/hr with a 100 km/hr tail-wind. A 500 km/hr zeppelin, is pure fantasy.
Rail is getting pretty close to that speed though. Yes I know they don't cross oceans. If we had not spent thousands of trillions of dollars (pounds,francs,ect) on private vehicles, the rails just might circle the globe by now.
The truth is, you do not need a holiday in the sun. Spend your holidays closer to home, and learn more about your country. If you are worried about economies being dependent on travel, donate some of the money you would have spent on airfare, to a job creating cause, like planting fruit or nut trees.
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#143 Because of the factories that make private motor vehicles, the carbon footprint math, will very likely make their use impossible. Besides, if everyone drove them, no one would get anywhere, because of the gridlock.
But giving up private motor vehicles, does not mean abandoning your entire way of life. If enough electric rail transport is built first, bicycle & rail trips, would be faster (and more convenient) than private vehicle trips. But you will not hear that from any major news organization.
Re #137 Fusion power?
You can wish for gold to fall from the sky, but it will never happen. Fusion power does fall from the sky though, it is called sunlight. One kilowatt per square meter. If you have money to invest, try solar-thermal.
And can the insults re living in caves and eating grass, you are not being helpful.
Everyone seems to want to blame someone else. The Skeptics think the 'warmists' are out to get them. The vegans blame the meat-eaters, the bicyclists, pedestrians and train-riders, blame the motorists. The south blames the north. Wake up people! We all need to calm down, and work together here!
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The planes are indeed hard to fix. Many suspect the only solution is algal and cellulose based biofuels for the planes, and renewable electricity for the cars and trains. Of course, we're a long way from that, and from the batteries needed for that before the cars can drive and recharge themselves (though that comes in the 2020s.) But at least it's doable.
There is also potential in electric planes if we get our batteries that good. That's because electric planes can fly much higher than jet aircraft -- no need to get oxygen to burn the fuel -- and get less drag up there. And they can have different wings, smaller wings, because they can take off like Harriers due to the high torque of electric motors. Or so we hope.
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#147 Environmentalists as a whole are unhelpful.
You want to build a coal/oil/gas power station - they complain about the CO2
You want to build a nuclear power station - they complain about the waste
You want to build a dam - they compain about the valley being flooded
You want to build wind turbines - they compain about the birds that get hit by the blades.
As I said, not helpful.
I also find people who scoff at the idea of fusion unhelpful. I'm sure at one point there were people who scoffed at the idea of heavier than air flying machines as well.
Given that fusion is the solution for CO2 emissions (why I still don't see as an issue since human activity accounts for a mere 3% of global CO2 emissions) and our future energy needs you'd better hope they crack it.
Because none of the eco-wackos are addressing the core issue; which is our civilisation is hopelessly dependent on a finite resource. Not filling the kettle to the brim, using low energy lightbulbs or wearing trousers made of hemp are going to save us. Oh, you can waffle on about solar panels all you want, but the energy density isn't high enough, nor will it ever be. Same for wind, tidal, wave or anything else.
So that leaves us heading for one place; war, and the biggest one the human race has ever waged, as the world's superpowers desperately try to secure what dwindling fuel sources are left.
THIS is the dilemma we face, not climate change - nobody's going to worrying about what global temperatures are doing when just to keep warm in winter means sending our kids off to fight a war that ultimately can't be won.
See, it's not just eco-wackos who're doom mongers :) They're just worrying about the wrong thing.
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Lighten up, dude.
There have been doom-mongers since the language was invented - and they have always been wrong.
The most famous recent doom-string started off with Thomas Malthus who predicted a peak human population of a few million and everyone would starve. Then railways were invented and commentators thought anyone traveling faster than a horse would die.
Then the various Jehovah Witness cults and Jim Jones with his Kool Aid.
Somewhere along the line the "peak oil" idea came along. We only have 30 years of oil left. The problem with this idea was that it was invented 30 years ago. Nobody bothers looking any further into the future for fuel supplies.
So enjoy today and tomorrow will be fine.
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It is interesting how the arguments have changed from the fossil fuel industries and energy producers being the problem to each of us being the problem. There are apparently two approaches available, 1) secure alternative non-fossil fuels, or 2)change our individual lifestyles to lessen the impact on the environment. It would seem to be that number 1 would be the better choice but number two has been where the push is. The political system with their hands in the pockets of coal and oil continue to direct the public into the role of villian and the coal and oil industries as benign service providers. In a world where bankers can invade and diminish personal retirement accounts and then be rewarded by the government with your taxes, I guess all that makes sense.
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I think we have to remember that there are some solutions that we know will reduce carbon emissions - eg not filling the kettle to the brim and there are others that we all hope will work - eg nuclear fusion. We need to work on both but it seems foolish to rely totally on as yet non-existent technology.
@147 - A reducing global population would reduce our consumption of the planet's resources and therefore reduce CO2 'waste'. So, yes, most environmentalists would agree we should be trying to do that. Indeed this seems to happen naturally to some degree already, because in developed nations people tend to realise that if you divide the pot between two or three those two or three will be better off than if there are four or five. To get people to accept the need to reduce the global population means changing the attitudes promoted by religions that encourage their adherents to do just the opposite! As the UN recently stated, progress on this is probably best achieved through education. The consequences of not reducing the global population? Sorry to be gloomy but it does look like the war to end all wars.
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Re 103# Take your foot off the pedal!
"In a nutshell, it is not just what we are doing as human beings consuming resources, it is also how many of us there are on the planet doing it."
The reality is exactly the opposite of that. Short of all out war, there is nothing we can do, to reduce our numbers quickly enough to make any difference. All out war is not an acceptable option!
The problem is not people, it is clearcuts, smokestacks and tailpipes.
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Re #122 "How long does an overseas holiday have to be before the carbon effect of the airtravel is neutralised by the carbon effect of being outside of the developed world?"
You have to heat your house a little anyway, or it will rot and they will have to cut down a forest to build a new one. So it needs to be a long holiday depending on how you commute to work.
I want to ask though; if my renewable energy powered flat is shared by a roommate (who would want it heated when I am away), and I commute by bicycle, am I not allowed to fly?
Maybe no one should fly until they figure out a cleaner fuel? It isn't a matter of, I don't eat meat, or I don't own a car, so I can fly. We all need to stop driving (or at least ask for more electric trains) AND stop eating so much meat, AND demand a global ban on clearcut logging, AND stop flying (or at least ask for cleaner fuel).
But I have no illusions that individual actions will add up to anything significant. Only when ideas are shared and many voices speak together,
does true change happen. Our personal carbon footprints are microscopic compared to power plants or other industrial energy users, and it is very difficult to vote with your feet, when are not enough trains to give you an option.
Now might be a good time to tell your leaders that you would please like some more renewable energy powered electric rail transport.
Re #147 "human activity accounts for a mere 3% of global CO2 emissions"
The important number is 36% of the co2 in the atmosphere was put there by humans. If we are adding 3% every year, we will be in real trouble pretty quickly.
I have nothing against fusion, but I do think we should invest in proven technologies, like wind and solar-thermal. How are super capacitors doing?
Re #149 "1) secure alternative non-fossil fuels, or 2)change our individual lifestyles to lessen the impact on the environment."
It may not be an either or situation. The math seems to indicate that we do both. But fear not. A bicycle and train commute, would be much safer, healthier, faster more reliable and convenient than the average commute today. You might even like it!
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OK - myth dispelling time.
Aviation, globally, amounts to approximately 2% of Global CO2 emissions
Aviation is an industry that is actively working to reduce it's own GHG emissions ahead of the regulation
Aviation is not just about people going on holiday
Much of the fresh, perishable foods that are imported, arrive in the UK by air. Overseas mail, mostly goes by air. Even some mail within the UK travels by air. Business relies on fast, reliable transmission of documents, motor parts, electronic components, fabrication, raw materials and other goods and services that all go by air. Yes, we can have conference calls, video meetings and electronic transfer of documents, but you can't get 15T of Argentinian Beef by email. Bananas no longer arrive by boat.
Aviation is a multi billion dollar industry that is vital in many ways to many people, globally. Medical supplies can reach parts of sub-saharan Africa in a fraction of the time by boat and road.
Since the birth of the Jet Engine, and it's first commercial use on the deHavilland Comet in the late 1950s, engine efficiency has improved, on average, around 1% per year. The entire industry CO2 emission rates have improved by around 1.5% per year (figures taken as average of total emission improvements year on year since the jet engine was first used commercially).
If we use the Comet as the starting point, and call that 100%, there was a very steep decline in fuel burn rates in the years leading into the 1960s. As we have developed better, more powerful, more efficient engines, and not to forget, the fuels have changed significantly since those days too, the fuel burn for a jet engine is now less than 60% of that of the Rolls Royce Avon engines that powered the Comet.
Rolls Royce are very active in developing new, more efficient engines. More efficiency in fuel burn means less emissions. Similarly, there is much research in developing new fuels. JetA and JetA1 (Kerosene), JetB (Gasoline) and AvGas (non-Jet Gasoline) are all used in different cases, and each has their own emission rating, but Bio-Fuels are also being trialled by a number of Jet operators today. It is becoming more common to have one engine powered by a Bio-Fuel while powering the others with JetA1, for instance. There are a number of international carriers that are trialling this now.
The ACARE (Advisory Council for Aerospace Research in Europe) has set the following targets to be reached by 2020.
- 80% reduction in NOx emissions
- 50% reduction in noise, and
- 50% reduction in CO2 emissions, per passenger/KM
Further, within the EU, we now have the most significant unilateral initiative so far, with the introduction of a new regulation from 1st January 2011, called EU ETS - the EU Emission Trading Scheme, which affect ALL commercial aviation operators that fly into, out of, or within the EU. All carriers MUST comply.
Some figures to digest:
Depending on operating conditions, and at cruising altitude, it is averaged that each jet engine, per 1KG of JetA or JetA1, will produce:
1.25Kg H2O
3.15Kg CO2
14g of NOx
1g of SO2
3.7g of CO
1.3g of UHC
0.04g of soot
Remarkable figures, considering this is per 1Kg of fuel - producing over 4Kg of emissions, but a quarter of that is water.
The entire industry is now having to re-evaluate the way it operates, and it means that some aspects of flying are going to change. The operators have to report all fuel uplift and burn per flight, optimising operating practices even more than before. The onus is now moving from Fuel Price, to Environmental Price.
A lot of work is currently underway to address the aviation industry emissions, and has been for a number of years now, much of it on a voluntary bases. Regulation is starting to come into effect, but it needs to be said, that aviation is leading the world, globally, on emissions reporting, evaluation and reduction.
More information can be found, for those that are interested, at http://ec.europa.eu/environment/climat/aviation_en.htm
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Interesting but another example of how the populist obsession with symbols of CO2 emission - often naughty capitalists fiddling while Rome burns - trivializes the debate and allows politicians to avoid actually doing something practical.
The "inconvenient truth" that livestock farming causes a third of greenhouse emissions and pollutes water gets no focus (important farmer votes, perhaps?). Available technology could protect air and water as well as generate some energy into the bargain. Technology based on Archimedes' screw can use weirs and old mills to generate electricity with less environmental impact than wind power (bird deaths are swept under the carpet in favor of saving the planet, but for who?). Better building codes could dramatically improve energy efficiency over 10-15 years but it is so much more satisfying to focus on cars and jets because of the link to nasty big business.
The result? Big gestures, much hand wringing, fatuous, derogative statements by politicians and a growing bandwagon of hijacking pollution control into free handouts to poor countries where the problem is usually nothing to do with climate change.
Not so much a rant as a cry of frustration at how expensively irrelevant IPCC is becoming.
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Two more thoughts. No one says anything about shipping which is quite the most polluting form of transportation, using bunker fuel and dumping effluent at sea.
Could we also have a little humility all round but especially from the climate change camp. Not every change is "global warming". Kilimanjaro's ice cap for example has not melted because its warmer; it is shrinking because it rains (snows) less than before so the ice and snow are not being replaced, and that started over 100 years ago (perhaps that data can be "adjusted" to fit the hockey stick of prof Jones). An honest response would be we do not really know but have some theories, some of which are scary, so let's take some steps to at least be cleaner and more efficient. I do emphasize "efficient"; faced with jobs now or hazy destruction in 50-100 years, your average Joe is going to choose jobs once the shine is off the new fad.
The silly thing is that we can protect jobs and the environment, but it means being pragmatic. A lot of the comments here vilify the way most people live, rather than thinking how to help them adapt to better practices. Simply taxing doesn't work; petrol costs 3x in Europe what it costs in the USA. So why did so many people buy SUVs, and American ones at that? Outright banning is political suicide. There is growing scepticism and cynicism about big science global warming programmes. What's left? Practical steps at a local level that people can see, understand and feel results (economic and environmental). Of course a lot of politicians will have to eat humble pie but they are spin masters so I am sure they will manage.
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#155 I think you are wrong about tax. The Irish tax on plastic bags reduced consumption dramatically. In Britain Tesco give loyalty card points to people who reuse their shopping bags.
However, as far as transport is concerned, the main problem is the journey to work because it is controlled by the employee, not the employer. The decreasing real cost of travelling by car combined with house price inflation has also encouraged people to live further from their work, so the current situation is bad news all round.
At the moment in Britain it is cheaper, if you already own a car (so it is depreciating and you pay road tax and insurance) to take it to work than to leave it at home and take public transport to work. By taxing journeys to work and using that money to subsidise public transport I'm convinced we could make a big difference easily and quickly. The side effects would be pleasant too - less noise, less pollution, more safety, less consumption of non-renewables and less traffic congestion. And the latter would help buses and commercial vehicles run on time.
The important point is that green tax money should be used, like offsetting, to mitigate the damage that burning the fossil fuels does.
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I do not own a car and cycle to work every day but this entire Man Made Global Warming Garbage is a complete fraud. Polar Bears can swim and are actually increasing in numbers oh yes and Penguins can also swim. If those scientists such as Professor Stott who do not go along with this Psudo Science are so wrong why do you lot never debate them publically. Are you not ashamed when those in this eco fascist movement say people should kill themselves to save the planet, this Eco Movement has become very ugly and nasty! Reminds me of another fudge so called science in the 1930's called Eugenics rather popular with an angry corporal from World War One called Adolf Hitler. Let us also not forget that the BBC is clearly in breach of it's charter given it's disgusting one sided and Bias presentation on this issue. I am PROUD TO BE A MAN MADE CLIMATE CHANGE DENIER!!!!!!!!
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#157
If you dont want to reduce your consumption of fossil fuels in order to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, how about reducing them to make the roads quieter, safer and less congested for us cyclists, or to reduce our reliance on oil-producing nations to feed our addiction.
Conserving resources as a principle has more in common with old testament parables than angry corporals. So, I'm afraid I can't accept that comment.
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As an aside, has anyone worked out how much energy an 'energy saving' lightbulb actually saves *overall*? Not just the bulb itself, but in the house as a whole - at this time of year, in the UK, when we're heating our homes.
Go on - try it. Let's say you replace a 60W light bulb with an 11W one. How much energy have you 'saved' overall in your house? Clue: It's not 49W.
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#159
You are right that the heat from light bulbs contributes to the heating of the house. So in my case since about the last week in November, when I started to use the heating, there has been very little saving from low energy lightbulbs. But for most of the year when the heating is not on, there is a saving and it is therefore worth doing.
You could also make a saving by leaving your hot washing-up water in the sink until it is cool rather than letting it flow down the plug hole to warm up the drains.
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The data actually support the Saab Estate as being more efficient than an A380. You report that your Saab gets 8.6l/100km: with four people on board that translates to 2.15l/100km per passenger. The A380 gets 2.9l/100km per passenger. Half the number of passengers and the difference is greater: 4.3l/100km per passenger vs 5.8l/100km per passenger. The differences are actually somewhat understated since 4 people in the Saab includes crew, while 525 in the A380 is only passenger count, crew excluded. Note, however, that the "crew" in the Saab often actually wants to travel to the same destination as the "passengers".
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Finding travel advice on the Web can feel a little like buying a car. First, you settle on the make and brand. Then you decide on the details and fittings you want. Last, you go hell-for-leather for the best deal. A search for "get travel advice" on Google throws back 80 million results; the market is packed with brands to get you what you need. So to help winnow down the choices, following are a few of the better sites that I've used to eke out pre-trip advice, including suggestions for a trip to Québec next month where I'll literally only have a half day to explore. Note that I don't really go into too much detail about social-networking sites like Facebook, Bebo, and Twitter, where the efficacy of your search for advice can depend on the breadth of your network, plus your own engagement and activity within those networks. If you have lots of well-traveled friends, tap into their font of travel wisdom. If not—or in addition—the below resources might help you get the info you need without too much extra legwork.
http://www.uknetguide.co.uk/Travel/Flights-to-Rio-Flights-from-the-UK-to-Brazil-103923.html
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