Some truths are hard to swallow.
One of those truths is that to get worldwide emissions down, less planes will be able to fly. We can yell and scream at this “truth”, but reality always wins in the end. There is simply not the technology in the pipeline to bring current or near-future planes’ emissions down fast enough.
So, less planes will be flying. How does this happen in a capitalist world?
Either by law changes decreeing it so, or by price increases, or both.
Perhaps the most coherent way to do it here will be to make it increasingly expensive to fly, using a carbon tax for instance. It would have to scale up pretty fast though—say in the next 5-10 years—to really start to bite.
And…..
Into this context of self-evident truth flies Air New Zealand. In some sense, this airline has the most to lose when it comes to cracking down on airline emissions, simply because New Zealand is so goddam far away from the rest of the planet.
And Air New Zealand knows it.
It already has a fully-fledged sustainability mechanism in place, which can be examined in detail on its website.
The reality though is that there are only so many trees you can plant to offset emissions, and more importantly: it doesn’t matter if you decrease the average emissions per passenger kilometre if you are intending to expand your network (and thus increase total emissions), as is normal in a capitalist setting.
And Air New Zealand knows it.
I almost fell off my chair the other day when the Guardian fed me this article:
“Air New Zealand’s chief environmental adviser has said he is in favour of increasing the price of flights to New Zealand and “putting off some people coming” as the country considers a new approach to tourism post-Covid.
“In an interview with Newsroom published on Tuesday, the airline’s chief environmental adviser, Sir Jonathon Porritt, said he supported hiking the price of international flights to pay for the greenhouse gas emissions they generated.
“His comments followed a recommendation by the parliamentary commissioner for the environment, Simon Upton, that people departing New Zealand (including citizens) should be required to pay a departure tax to offset the environmental cost of flying .
“As proposed by Upton, the tax could add as much as $155 (£80) to an economy fare to the United Kingdom and would be used to fund climate initiatives in the Pacific.”
Putting aside the fact that the tax should be much higher, this is pretty revolutionary stuff. An international airline’s advisor is suggesting that ticket prices need to go up.
He didn’t shut right up there either. He kept going!
“But he said that the aviation industry urgently needed to be forced to reduce its emissions and that there was “no going back” to tourism as it was pre-Covid. Porritt said air travel was a privilege, not a right.
“Controversial though it may be, I’m in favour of putting off some people coming to New Zealand. I just don’t believe in the idea that the number of international visitors to New Zealand can grow and grow and grow without limits. I just don’t believe that is credible [or] right. So, if a higher price for the privilege of flying to New Zealand puts some people off, good.”
Amazeballs.
Sometimes I feel like I’m flogging away at a dead horse here, but this is definitely not one of those times.
I have an up-and-coming project that deals with exactly this issue when it comes to over-tourism in New Zealand. I’ll let you know more about it when the time comes!
Until then, try to hold on to your chair!
[Photo: imageBROKER/Alamy]