Offering Us Yet More Flights is Plane Crazy

By RICHARD DYER Friends of the Earth

AVIATION is already the fastest growing source of CO2 emissions.

Climate experts say unless the growth in air travel is curbed it will be impossible to meet Government targets for cutting them.

Britain’s share of aviation emissions doubled between 1990 and 2005. Because of the way the chemicals react at altitude, they do up to four times the damage of those from other sources.

Plans to bring aviation under the European Emissions Trading Scheme will make little difference to the industry’s carbon footprint.

Given the evidence, it is plane crazy the Government is prepared to allow massive expansion of Britain’s airports – which will inevitably lead to more flights and more pollution. CO2 emissions have risen under Labour – despite promises of cuts – and its transport policy must bear much of the blame.

More money must be invested in high-speed rail links – such as the recently opened line between St Pancras and Paris – to offer alternatives to short-haul flights.

And the cost of flying should reflect the damage it does to the environment. Every year the industry gets tax-breaks worth about pounds 9billion, including tax-free fuel and exemption from VAT. This must end.

However, the key action for the Government must be to review its aviation policy – and ditch plans for the third runway.

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