The aviation industry is growing rapidly, so does the number of aircraft in the world, and so the earth temperature is getting higher as well. We affect the climate in every visible and unnoticed way existed that we don’t even know we are causing any harm to the environment, but when it comes to aviation, our behavior is quite clear and the aviation impact on climate change is obvious and needs to be changed. In this topic, we will discuss the flight shame movement and how aviation contributes to climate change.

The aviation carbon emissions

Aviation emissions contributions are estimated to be 2,5% of the radiative forcing on climate, which may not seem to be a hefty influence for some people, but when it comes to our earth every little negative contribution leaves its footprint.

Hopefully, we can see a gleam of hope in the skies lately, and some actions for more sustainable flying are being taken. Sustainable fuel is our hope for the aviation industry right now and Rolls-Royce for instance just succeeded in their test flying and a Boeing 747 Jumbo was up in the skies with 100% sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).

Other airlines are also looking forward to a more sustainable future with reducing plastic and weight initiatives, but with no significant emission mitigation being implemented for the industry, the associated percentage of aviation is predicted to reach up to 5 percent. That’s why some people pledged to go flight free, to eliminate their carbon footprint on the climate.

So, should we give up flying?

Well, the flying industry is growing 5% further a year, meanwhile, efficiency improvements barely increase by 1%, so we are not even close. Let’s be realistic, giving up flying is not going to happen, but at least we can put other alternatives into our considerations.

What are the alternatives?

Trains are a great solution, especially the high-speed ones, and the carbon footprint of trains is slight compared to the aviation impact, as most of the aviation footprint is due to domestic aviation, and yes, unfortunately, trains are not that fast but they are environment friendly.

Determine our extreme necessities

International meetings and conferences for instance have been proven to be a slight reason for traveling abroad, especially after the Covid-19 pandemic when the whole world went online.

The collective and individual efforts

Speaking only to individuals, asking them to change their habits can’t make the earth cooler, but it does make a difference, and raising awareness makes the biggest difference. We all know it’s all about businesses and politics, which means decision-makers need to take their actions towards the environment into account.

Airlines must adapt new efficiency improvements and meet other standards to be well armed for climate change.

So what if you have to travel?

How can you reduce your carbon footprint? as follows you can read about some ways travel more environment friendly.

1. Reduce your carriage: More personal carriage equals much lift for the aircraft to carry which means more fuel to burn and that is exactly what’s known by the “aviation carbon footprint”.
2. Always try to choose the newest aircraft possible: New aircraft are most likely to be more fuel-efficient and that means fewer carbon emissions.
3. Choose direct flights without layovers: That can also reduce the amount of your emissions footprint.
4. Invest in a good carbon offset project: This is a very important behavior to adapt generally whether you lean on aviation as transportation or not. It helps when we think of new ideas, means, and projects to offset our carbon emissions.

Having all that in mind can truly have a statistically significant positive impact on the environment.

Let’s travel guilt free

And lastly, decreasing the number of times we get on a plane doesn’t mean we have to stop traveling or discovering the world, and we need to remember that safety has always been number one when it comes to aviation. So directly get hurt by getting on a plane, but getting on a plane frequently and unconcernedly can truly get us hurt when we are on the ground.

Sources

• https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20190909-why-flight-shame-is-making-people-swap-planes-for-trains
• https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200218-climate-change-how-to-cut-your-carbon-emissions-when-flying
• https://ourworldindata.org/co2-emissions-from-aviation
• https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260914719_Aviation_and_climate_change
• https://www.gettyimages.com (cover Image)