 |
“While all of our minds are rightly focused on
the need to protect ourselves and our communities against the serious health
threat of COVID-19 and its wider economic impacts, the climate and nature
emergencies have not gone away and are quietly getting worse. Indeed, aviation
sector carbon emissions are increasing globally, and airports are a major
contributor to local air and noise pollution, risking public health.
|
Any bailouts that are granted must be used to
address these challenges together, and avoid exacerbating them.
Therefore any support packages for airline
companies must set conditions to protect workers’ rights, prevent public money
from being diverted into the pockets of shareholders, and reorientate the
industry towards helping to meet the Paris climate agreement. Demand reduction
measures should be implemented gradually over time to bring the sector within
safe limits for the climate.”
|
Financial help for airlines 'should come with
strict climate conditions'
Former EU climate chief Miguel Arias Cañete fears end
of Covid-19 will bring higher carbon emissions
“We are not flying as much – why not keep not flying?”
asked Kevin Anderson, professor of energy and climate change at Manchester
University. “Why not reinforce the good things that are coming out of
Covid-19?”
Fiona
Harvey Environment correspondent
Wed 1 Apr
2020 11.00 BSTLast modified on Wed 1 Apr 2020 13.43 BST
Financial
help from taxpayers to airlines hit by the coronavirus crisis must come with
strict conditions on their future climate impact, the former EU climate
commissioner and a group of green campaigners have said.
“It must be
conditional, otherwise when we recover we will see the same or higher levels of
carbon dioxide [from flying],” said Miguel Arias Cañete, the EU climate
commissioner who led the bloc to the Paris agreement, in an interview with the
Guardian. “We know the level of emissions we have to commit to [under Paris].
They [airlines] are worried about survival and will need lots of support, lots
of liquidity – that gives them a big responsibility.”
A group of
26 civil society groups in the UK have written to the chancellor, Rishi Sunak,
demanding “stringent conditions” on any rescue, including strict targets on
greenhouse gases in line with the Paris agreement and measures to help workers.
“Public money must be used to address social and environmental priorities, as
well as economic needs,” they wrote.
Aviation
has all but ceased in some countries and flights are vastly down in most
others, owing to the lockdowns and other suppression measures. Airlines have
been appealing to governments for bailouts as fleets have been grounded.
But
campaigners and experts fear that after the Covid-19 outbreak has waned, the
sector could bounce back with the aid of public money and send emissions
soaring.
In their
letter to the chancellor, the campaigners – including Greenpeace, Flight Free,
the IPPR and New Economics Foundation thinktanks, and Tax Justice – call for
the government to take equity stakes in airlines rather than handing out cash
or loans. They want to see social benefits with workers’ rights enforced,
including a living wage and no mass redundancies a condition of any rescue. In
the longer term, they want to see support for a “just transition” for workers
to move to jobs in lower carbon industries.
They also
want a new fiscal regime that includes a frequent flyer levy or air miles levy,
replacing air passenger duty, which would reduce demand without removing access
to flights from those with limited alternatives or limited resources, by
shifting the tax burden to frequent leisure flyers. About half of people in the
UK do not fly in any given year, but 1% of people take a fifth of all flights.
Rebecca
Newsom, head of political affairs at Greenpeace UK, said: “Emergency funding
must be used to tackle emergencies, not to support business as usual.
Conditions are needed to protect workers’ rights, prevent public money from
being diverted into the pockets of shareholders, and reduce demand gradually
over time through a frequent flier levy, so that the sector operates within
safe limits for the climate.”
Attaching
conditions to any bailout could take several forms. Cañete wants to see a
carbon tax or emissions trading system such as the one operating under the EU.
“Market mechanisms are needed,” he said.
Airlines
UK, a trade body, said the industry was already taking steps to reduce their
environmental impact before the coronavirus crisis hit. “The UK aviation sector
has already committed to achieving net zero carbon emissions by 2050 – the only
national aviation industry to do so,” said a spokesperson. “This will be
achieved via a range of measures, including airspace modernisation, the
development and commercialisation of sustainable aviation fuels, new cleaner
planes, and the UN carbon offsetting scheme Corsia.”
Airlines
face difficult choices ahead. More efficient aircraft will help to reduce
emissions, but the impact will be limited. Biofuels offer a possible answer,
but they are still expensive and there are difficulties in ensuring that the
sources are environmentally sustainable. Electric planes are still some way in
the future, and solar-powered flight a distant dream.
“We need to
stimulate research and development into things like hydrogen fuel,” said
Barbara Buchner, managing director of the Climate Policy Initiative. “We need
more proactive thinking from airlines – they can’t imagine we will go back to
the way they were before.”
The
coronavirus disruption may also bring about permanent changes in people’s
habits, some experts hope. Business flying has stopped meetings from happening,
but people have found ways to work with video conferencing and other cheap
technology, forcing businesses to question whether their staff need to fly as
much in future.
“We are not flying as much – why not keep not
flying?” asked Kevin Anderson, professor of energy and climate change at
Manchester University. “Why not reinforce the good things that are coming out
of Covid-19?”
One effect
of the coronavirus crisis has yet to be felt. Under the Corsia (Carbon
offsetting and reduction scheme for international aviation) system adopted by
the International Civil Aviation Organisation, airlines would have to curb
their future emissions using efficiencies, alternative fuels and offsetting,
such as investing in forests, renewable energy or other carbon-cutting
projects.
Before the
coronavirus crisis emerged, airlines pushed for the average emissions in the
years 2019 and 2020 to be used as the baseline by which future emissions would
be judged. In any years from 2021 onwards, when emissions from the sector
exceed the average of 2019 and 2020, the difference between actual emissions
and the baseline will have to be offset, meaning airlines will have to buy
carbon credits from carbon-cutting projects.
Choosing
2019 and 2020 should have made those targets easy to meet for airlines if air
travel had continued to rise this year as it has in recent years. With the
Covid-19 pandemic, however, the disruption to travel means emissions are likely
to be drastically lower than envisaged for 2020 – meaning Corsia’s future
carbon targets will be much tougher for them to reach, if the scheme goes ahead
without changes.
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário