In early December, followers of BBC news will have seen David Shukman’s reports from the U.N’s 24th Climate Change Conference in Poland.  The reports showed Polish coal miners hard at work and smoke from power station chimneys billowing into the air.  They emphasized the irony of a climate conference taking place in a country wedded to the world’s most polluting fossil fuel.

Now here is a question: which country, Poland or the United Kingdom, emits more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere?  Answer: the UK.  Which country produces more per capita?  Answer: Poland, which has a smaller population.  But which country emits more per capita on a consumption basis, taking account of the carbon embedded in imports and exports?  Answer: the UK.  All easily verified from a number of sources, including (for instance) Defra and the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency.

Then there is international aviation – which would tip the balance even more against the UK.  In October 2017, the Dept for Transport published “UK Aviation Forecasts 2017”, which included material on the UK’s CO2 emissions associated with flying.  It reported that 38 MtCO2, around 10% of the emissions we produce as a country, is due to flying.  This is much higher than most statistics released by the industry, which suggest that flying only accounts for some 2-3% of the total.

Why the difference?  Because most reporting of the airline’s impact on the environment is misleading.  Firstly, international flights are generally left out of statistics.  In the EU Emissions Trading Scheme, only flights within the European Economic Area are taken into account.  Flights to/fro anywhere else in the world are simply ignored.  Given that Europe is pretty small on a global scale, this means that all long-haul flights are omitted from the EU ETS and associated statistics.

Secondly, radiative forcing – the extra impact over and above direct CO2 emissions from flying at high altitude – is also omitted from the statistics.  The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) recommends a multiplier of between 2 and 4 to convert direct CO2 emissions from aviation into CO2-equivalent (CO2e) greenhouse gas impact emissions.  The DoT’s figure of 38 MtCO2 is just direct emissions.  Even if we use the bottom of IPCC’s scale (Defra uses a figure of 1.9), the implication is that in Britain today, flying accounts for at least 75 MtCO2e per annum.

International aviation has been left out of the Paris Agreement 2015.  There are no internationally-agreed targets to reduce it.  This omission is sometimes rationalized on the grounds that it is complex to attribute the emissions to individual countries.  But is it?  The DoT report simply uses the UNFCCC’s own recommendation of attributing flights in one direction – i.e. flights leaving Britain should be included in British emissions totals while flights arriving in Britain (from a different country) should not.  Is this not sensible and straightforward?

Without political will to do something about it, the damage from aviation is under-reported and hence under-recognized.  It flys under the radar, so to speak.

So what is to be done? In May 2018, Sonia Sodha, the Observer’s chief leader writer, wrote a piece in the Guardian newspaper suggesting an individual cap on air travel, that individuals could trade with one another.  An air mile allowance, say enough to cover a long-haul flight or three short-haul flights per annum (this may be too much in fact, but we have to start somewhere). 

This is the best suggestion I have seen.  It does not rely on blind faith (“technology will save us”) or hit the impecunious unfairly.  It provides a flexible mechanism whereby those who have the most reason to fly can acquire the means to do so – at an appropriate price. 

It would be very unpopular with business and holiday makers.  But if we are worried about popularity, then hope is in short supply.