Nations Agree To Curb Emissions From Flying by 2050 (nytimes.com) 58
After almost a decade of talks, the nations of the world have committed to drastically lower emissions of planet-warming gases from the world's airplanes by 2050, a milestone in efforts to ease the climate effects of a fast-growing sector. From a report: The target to reach "net zero" emissions -- a point in which air travel is no longer pumping any additional carbon dioxide into the atmosphere -- would require the aviation industry to significantly step up its climate efforts. Previously, companies had relied on offsetting aviation's emissions growth through tree-planting programs or through yet-to-be-proven technology to pull carbon dioxide out of the air.
But to reach net zero, companies and governments would need to invest hundreds of billions of dollars in increasingly efficient planes and cleaner fuels to sharply reduce emissions from air travel itself. And even those investments are unlikely to be enough, compelling countries and companies to adopt policies to curb flying itself, by scrapping fuel subsidies or halting airport expansion plans, for example, or ending frequent flier programs. That puts the onus on the world's richest countries, which account for the bulk of global air travel. The richest 20 percent of people worldwide take 80 percent of the flights, according to estimates by the International Council on Clean Transportation, a nonprofit think tank. The top 2 percent of frequent fliers take about 40 percent of the flights.
Emissions from global commercial aviation made up about 3 percent of global emissions in 2019, and had surged more than 30 percent over the previous decade before the coronavirus pandemic hit and traffic slumped. But air travel has come back with a vengeance, making action to address rising emissions imperative. The aviation industry has been slow to address its emissions, which aren't covered by the Paris accord, the 2015 agreement among the nations of the world to fight climate change. Instead, a United Nations-like body called the International Civil Aviation Organization has overseen the climate talks. Those talks quickly became a microcosm of the politics involved in global climate negotiations, with less wealthy nations arguing that they should not face the same restrictions as richer nations.
But to reach net zero, companies and governments would need to invest hundreds of billions of dollars in increasingly efficient planes and cleaner fuels to sharply reduce emissions from air travel itself. And even those investments are unlikely to be enough, compelling countries and companies to adopt policies to curb flying itself, by scrapping fuel subsidies or halting airport expansion plans, for example, or ending frequent flier programs. That puts the onus on the world's richest countries, which account for the bulk of global air travel. The richest 20 percent of people worldwide take 80 percent of the flights, according to estimates by the International Council on Clean Transportation, a nonprofit think tank. The top 2 percent of frequent fliers take about 40 percent of the flights.
Emissions from global commercial aviation made up about 3 percent of global emissions in 2019, and had surged more than 30 percent over the previous decade before the coronavirus pandemic hit and traffic slumped. But air travel has come back with a vengeance, making action to address rising emissions imperative. The aviation industry has been slow to address its emissions, which aren't covered by the Paris accord, the 2015 agreement among the nations of the world to fight climate change. Instead, a United Nations-like body called the International Civil Aviation Organization has overseen the climate talks. Those talks quickly became a microcosm of the politics involved in global climate negotiations, with less wealthy nations arguing that they should not face the same restrictions as richer nations.
They could start by not subsidising fuel (Score:5, Interesting)
Jet fuel is one of the few oil-based products globally not subject to taxation. It creates strange economics whereby it is cheaper to fly to another country (with all the emissions that entails) than it is to take a 4-hour train journey.
If they want to curb emissions, rather than focusing on developing as yet non-existent technology, they could start by getting the market economics sorted out.
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If they want "Net Zero" (isn't that an ISP?) emissions, they're going to have to start switching to solar powered aircraft or whatever like today.
Hydrogen or hydrocarbon fuels produced using a solar energy source is a possible way to do this.
Has one advantage over many solar applications; you could set up the synfuel plant wherever solar energy is plentiful.
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Even better, they can propose a ban on chemtrails.
You know that's not a real thing [wikipedia.org]?
Re: They could start by not subsidising fuel (Score:4, Insightful)
Exactly this. Tax aviation fuel the same as any other fuel. There is no reason not to do this.
Doing so will dramatically raise the cost of flying, which will reach the goal tomorrow, instead of in 2050.
Making promises for two decades out is just virtue signaling. If the mean it, they can do it now.
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Red diesel is exempt or reduced rated for tax in the UK. Don't diesel trains use this still? What about electrical trains - do they get their energy tax free? Does international commercial shipping also pay tax on their filthy bunker fuel? Not saying that rail shouldn't have a tax breaks like trains, but that narrative about airlines getting special treatment might not be wholly accurate.
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Red diesel is exempt or reduced rated for tax in the UK. Don't diesel trains use this still? What about electrical trains - do they get their energy tax free? Does international commercial shipping also pay tax on their filthy bunker fuel? Not saying that rail shouldn't have a tax breaks like trains, but that narrative about airlines getting special treatment might not be wholly accurate.
No the narrative is correct. Your special diesel case applies to the UK (and even then it is not tax exempt, just taxed at a rebated rate). That is whataboutism that applies to a single country. Everything else in your post is conjecture and incorrect as well. Yes international commercial shipping pays tax on bunker fuel. Yes electricity is taxed even when you're an industrial consumer.
Airlines are completely unique in having their fuel subject to a global treaty where the signatories agree they will not ta
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Jet fuel is one of the few oil-based products globally not subject to taxation. It creates strange economics whereby it is cheaper to fly to another country (with all the emissions that entails) than it is to take a 4-hour train journey....
That's because the upper classes fly around a lot and they're in control, so don't expect any real change. The upper classes are so hopelessly addicted to affluence and power that they cannot be turned from the dark side of the economy. Sadly, there will need to be an economic collapse of the old before there can be the rise of a new economy. This is the way.
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Jet fuel is one of the few oil-based products globally not subject to taxation. It creates strange economics whereby it is cheaper to fly to another country (with all the emissions that entails) than it is to take a 4-hour train journey.
And if there are no trains you could drive your gasoline powered car, which is even worse in terms of emissions.
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Sure they are (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm genuinely looking forward to western governments ACTUALLY BLOCKING people from flying due to their climate load.*
Hilariously unlikely, but the entire climate-thing seems to be an arena where promises are treated as reality and are immediately forgotten with no consequence.
*Not just snark, I genuinely am. Pre-covid I easily flew 40+ times a year and have continued to drag my feet professionally about resuming that absurd amount of travel. Any additional excuse I can get to tell my company "Nah, I'll do this one remotely" is aces in my book, for whatever reason. Too much CO2? Sorry, no flight. Alligators on the tarmac? Can't go today!
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Well... they did "promise" that were going to "solve" the issue by 2050, which means that they're really just virtue signaling and leaving the next administration to deal with the problem in the hopes that some magical anti-pollution technology exists by then.
In other words, they are doing the exact same thing that politicians in the 1990s and 2000s did to "deal" with this issue.
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France already has. If it's less than a few hours by train then you can't fly.
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France does? I wish the US had a better high-speed rail system. We have the technology and the perfect routes already laid out. We just have to deal with stupid people on this side of the pond.
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A lot of those stupid people are in Congress, or work at Amtrak. For example, if you want to take a train from Cincinnati to Chicago for a long weekend, you can forget about it. That train doesn't run on Friday, so you're leaving Saturday at 1:41a. And that train doesn't return until Tuesday at 3:27a - only taking 8.5 hours each way. Convenient!
In comparison, a flight from Cincinnati to Chicago takes about 1 hour and 20 minutes and costs less than $20 more, and basically takes off any time you like from
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I'm genuinely looking forward to western governments ACTUALLY BLOCKING people from flying due to their climate load.
That is a pretty silly response to a issue that has other ways to fix it. In this day and age there is really no way to block people from flying. There are environmentally friendly jetfuels. They are just more expensive than what is currently used. Of course that would drive the cost of flying up so people would fly less, which I'm good with too.
On that note it seems to me aviation would be a great place for hydrogen based fuels to be used.
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I'm genuinely looking forward to western governments ACTUALLY BLOCKING people from flying due to their climate load.
They'll just make it more expensive. As another poster noted, jet fuel is currently untaxed anywhere in the world. Taxing it the same as every other fuel, and then going the next step and adding carbon taxes (to all fossil fuels, not just jet fuel), will make flying significantly more expensive, at least unless/until non-fossil alternatives are created. We'd need a large improvement in battery energy density to make that work for long-haul flights (though it can probably work for short flights now). Methane
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Methane-powered aircraft might work reasonably well, and methane can be created from non-fossil sources
Do you mean methane from biological sources? That's not likely practical. Do you mean synthesized methane? If we have synthesized carbon neutral methane then we are a small step from liquid fuels like jet fuel and aviation gasoline that are carbon neutral, because we use methane now to synthesize lubricating oils and that's not all that different from synthesizing fuels. Lubricating oils and fuel oils are really only distinct in their application, not in their substance. It's the same thing. We don't
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Do you mean synthesized methane?
Yep. And of course it's just an energy storage/transportation mechanism, not an energy source. This is obvious.
We don't have to make jet fuel expensive. We have to make jet fuel from something other than petroleum less expensive.
Meh. Just make jet fuel expensive and someone will find a way to make it from something other than fossil fuels, or find some other way to power jet aircraft. Where there's an opportunity for profit, someone will find a way.
I remember a chemist talking about how rising electricity costs was hindering his development of new battery chemistry. If we don't keep energy costs low then people like this chemist can't afford to hire technicians and assistants to give us the best in technology.
Bullshit, the chemist was either bad at what he was doing or at least very bad at convincing others of its value. If he had a demonstrably good idea for a significantly-better
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Only 50 years too late... (Score:3)
need more rail maybe Maglev 300-500 mph range (Score:2)
need more rail maybe Maglev 300-500 mph range
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Too complex, too expensive compared to normal high speed rail. Compare the cost of building something thats 2 steel rails seperated by blocks of concrete compared to an active track with embedded magnets which needs to be raised above ground due to its physical size. And even if the track itself cost buttons, you'd still need entirely new rights of way to be bought up and stations to build.
There's a reason even the chinese with their cost cutting builders have limited maglev to an airport link.
How about not flying empty planes? (Score:3)
There have been over 5,000 empty flights in the UK since 2019. I don't know about other places.
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https://www.cbsnews.com/news/e... [cbsnews.com]
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/01/1... [cnbc.com]
https://www.theguardian.com/en... [theguardian.com]
https://www.euronews.com/green... [euronews.com]
(... although the EU claims that this is a myth. Despite quotes from
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Small correction: this isn't about "flying a route", this is about "rights to use certain time slots to land and take off in specific airports".
Supply and demand on those is extremely lopsided, as there's a very limited amount of those slots in large airports and a lot of companies that would like to fly in and out of those airports. As a result there are complex reservation systems with prioritize existing slot holders. If you don't use those slots, you lose a right to them and other get a shot at buying t
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So there were empty flights taking those slots just to demonstrate that they're being used during covid.
Which means burning thousands of tons of jet fuel for no purpose other than satisfying bureaucracy.
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Burning thousands of tons of jet fuel and wear and tear on parts as well as runways.
But it's not so much about "bureaucracy" as competition for extremely important and highly constrained commodity. In this regard, it's not very different from why GPU prices were insane during mining boom, or why natgas purchase prices across several European markets blew up recently. When supply of a good is severely constrained, people are willing to pay a significant premium to hold on to their existing delivery contracts
Wow, so soon? (Score:4, Insightful)
Good to see them going out on a limb there.
How about making the cost of flying match its enviromental impact. Here in the UK vehicle fuel is taxed like you wouldn't believe and rail travel is also expensive, yet air fares seem in some circumstances to be entirely divorced from reality. eg 20 quid on a budget airline to fly london to scotland when the same train fare can be 10x that much with the car not costing much less in fuel.
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How about making the cost of flying match its enviromental impact.
Sure. Now we just need to agree on how much that cost should be, who is responsible for collecting it, where the money goes, and a means to punish those that fail in those tasks.
In other words, that's not going to happen.
What you described is a "carbon tax" and in any place on Earth where the people have a say in what taxes they pay then there's going to be a problem in getting agreement. The idea of "no taxation without representation" goes deep and wide. Are people going to vote themselves a carbon tax
Typical finger-pointing (Score:4, Insightful)
It always seems to be the fault of the richest nations, doesn't it? Never mind the fact that second-world nations don't do anything in terms of environmental controls. They say they do but you can't prove it. You can still but CFC-based automotive air-conditioning coolant in Mexico. In the U.S., not only do you have to shitcan perfectly functional A/C units but mechanics have to invest in expensive recapture equipment. In Mexico, they just vent it straight into the air. The U.S. is spending a ton of money replacing power generation with expensive and arguably lesser equipment while China, India, and others are still using hydrocarbons to generate most of their power. The third-world doesn't give a damn about catalytic converters on their vehicles let along any other emission controls. The rumored Pacific Garbage Patch turns out to not be the fault of first-world countries but the third-world ones. But no, it's still all the fault of the richest nations. If climate change is a global problem, then everybody has to do the same things to combat it. No country should be able to whine that they can't afford it.
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It always seems to be the fault of the richest nations, doesn't it?
In this case that seems to be accurate, I'd think. Poor people don't fly much on jet aircraft.
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It always seems to be the fault of the richest nations, doesn't it? Never mind the fact that second-world nations don't do anything in terms of environmental controls.
Yes it does. What do you think makes nations rich? Consider that I am sending this to you in a well lit room from a computer, TV on downstairs, boiler cranked keeping my house at a lovely constant temperature, and after this post I'm going downstairs to my oversized French door fridge to get a nice cold beer to eat food that I as a rich person paid someone to deliver to me. My server downstairs has a power budget that some poorer nations can run their entire home from.
You are wealthy of the back of your ind
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In the U.S., not only do you have to shitcan perfectly functional A/C units
You can retrofit existing units to use a different cooling agent. And for the specialty units that can not be retrofitted, you can use recaptured gas.
mechanics have to invest in expensive recapture equipment
You can vent your used CFC into the air. People recapture it because it's _valuable_, so the recapture equipment pays itself off very quickly.
In 2049, we'll move the goal posts (Score:1)
Let's agree to do something we won't have to do (Score:3)
2050. In other words, 28 years from now. Or, in about 7 elections.
Even if the average geezer currently in power is still alive, does he really have to worry about still having to do the politics dog-and-pony-show, or will he already have more money than he can spend in the rest of his time and call it quits?
2050 or 2100 doesn't matter, either does not have to be implemented by anyone currently in power. Likely not even any dictators.
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I know you like to shit on politicians with long term plans, but do you by any chance have a magic flying-thingy-mcgreener that suddenly solves the problem?
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No, but I could start taking them a bit more serious if they presented some milestones that should be reached when they're still in office. Else, allow me to promise you perfume farting unicorns around 2070.
Will the rich give up their private jets? (Score:4, Insightful)
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The Politburo will also be sacrificing your air travel.
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I like this comment. The whataboutism is over 9000 given how many commercial flights there are daily, many of which covering insane distances, while we bitch about the order of magnitude less smaller planes doing multiple orders of magnitude less airmiles.
Personally I'm going to turn on the AC and keep my windows open until Kim Kardashian stops Tweeting because her use of her mobile phone is just a waste of CO2!
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But at a deeper level, it touches on the idea that the Elite (for some quantity of "elite") don't have to play by the same rules as the rest of us. And, to some degree, it implies the elite honestly don't give a rat's ass, so long as they get to continue to play by their own rules.
Because you could argue commercial air travel--because more people are carried than by private jet per pound of jet fuel per mile consumed--is sort of the equivalent of 'mass transit.' At which point this starts looking very much
Human stupidity (Score:2)
Because, of course, those less wealthy nations are not located on the same planet as the richer ones. /facepalm
Don't ask to pollute because the richer nations did, that's just going to give you even more environmental problems, even quicker!
Are people really that fucking dumb?!
They agreed to nothing. (Score:1)
If the end goal of any agreement o plan is more than an election away then it means nothing. They didn't agree to anything because in 28 years it is unlikely any of these same people will be in a position to follow through. If by chance there is at least one person still there then these people will be in the minority and incapable of following through.
I remember Democrat candidates for POTUS laying out a "ten year plan" for energy and global warming. I was baffled that anyone would take this seriously.
Haha (Score:3)
If they carry through on this, it's the end of airplane travel. Just use sailboats.
Nuclear powered ships (Re:Haha) (Score:1)
It's difficult to find news on this now with so much about nuclear weapons spoiling the search results but there are developments in nuclear powered civilian ships in the news that look promising. Especially out of UK. One example with a short mention of nuclear powered ships:
https://www.express.co.uk/news... [express.co.uk]
But then if we have nuclear power for electricity on shore, and for propulsion at sea, then we have the ability to scrape up some petroleum or synthesized hydrocarbons for our airplanes. The fine sum
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So dramatic.
Synthetic jet fuel made from renewable sources costs about ten times as much as fossil Jet-A right now, and will probably drop to about 50-100% more in the future. Fuel costs are about 10% of an airline's costs, so if you switched to net zero synthetic fuel today you'd double ticket prices, and by 2050 you're looking at more like a 5% increase.
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No it's not the end of airplane travel. It'll just revert to the price it was 20 years ago. I guess my days of flying to the other side of the continent for less than the price of a mains and a beer at a restaurant are over. And no I'm not being funny I have regularly flown distances over 1000km for under $30.
All they had to do was not reopen. (Score:2)
Biden should have stepped in and made it official, I mean if you have the power to dump our emergency oil reserves....
Hey (Score:1)