Inconvenient Holidays: Why We Can’t Fly Anymore
I’ve been struggling with this one for some time.
I know that flying (jet travel) is mega-bad for the environment. I know that one trip across the United States and back emits more CO2 into the atmosphere than all the driving I do in an entire year. I know that air travel is simply not sustainable. And yet, I persist for the most part (my most recent trip to L.A. was by auto, but that hasn’t been the norm) in clapping my hands over my ears and eyes (along with the majority of the eco-community) and pretending that it is somehow okay to fly, that for some reason the gases and particulates released from a jet that contribute three times as much to global warming as C02 alone, don’t really exist.
But I’m finally forced to climb the pulpit and scream: WE CANNOT FLY ANY LONGER!!!
If we really do give a damn, jet travel is simply out of the question. Yes, this impacts our plans to travel the world. It curtails business travel. But we have telephones for conference calls and our desire for tropical paradise, one would think, is far less important than the need to survive as a species.
It’s inconvenient to not fly any longer, but is it really that big of a deal? Do I give a damn about the planet or not? What about you? Hey, if you have a solution to this seemingly intractable issue, please, chime in - let me know!
Our friend George Monbiot weighs in on this topic in his book “HEAT: How to Stop the Planet Burning”. Here’s what he has to say (and the eco-community has slammed him for this as too many ‘greens’ refuse to believe they may actually have to sacrifice anything at all). You really should read the book as it sets up the following with hard numbers/facts/data that are hard to refute:
“A 90 per cent cut in carbon emissions means the end of distant foreign holidays, unless you are prepared to take a long time getting there. It means that business meetings must take place over the internet or by means video conferences. It means that trans-continental journeys must made by train - and even then not by the fastest trains - or bus. It means that journeys around the world must be reserved for visiting the people you love, and that they will require both slow travel and the saving up of carbon rations. It means the end of shopping trips to New York, parties in Ibiza, second homes in Tuscany and, most painfully for me, political meetings in Porto Alegre - unless you believe that these activities are worth the sacrifice of the biosphere and the lives of the poor. But I urge you to remember that these privations affect a tiny proportion of the world’s people. The reason they seem so harsh is that this tiny proportion almost certainly includes you.
Recognizing that is was possible for a human being to fly; then that it was possible for a human being to fly long distances; then that it was possible for many humans to do so; then that it was possible for YOU to do so, required a series of imaginative leaps. It required the construction by the people of the 20th century of a possible world which did not exist before. No one in Europe ever thought of shopping in New York or visiting friends in Australia before planes allowed them to do so. Recognizing that while it is still possible for a human being to fly, it will no longer be possible for many humans to do so, indeed that it will no longer be possible for YOU to do so, requires a similar series of imaginative efforts. But if it was possible to construct one alternative world, it is surely possible to construct another, and to adjust ourselves to that world (scarcely conceivable as it now seems) just as we adjusted to the other - even less conceivable - existence.
I do not pretend that this will be easy, or that my finding will win me any friends. Those whose freedmos must be curtailed happen to be members of the world’s most powerful classes. Worse still, they happen to be us. The promises we have been made - of tropical sunlight in the dead of winter, of one-week safaris in the Maasai Mara, of the sampling of pleasant fruits and princely delicates throughout the new-found world - have shaped our expectations, the pictures we carry of our future lives. We have come to believe we can do anything. We can do anything. Accepting that we no longer possess the powers of angels or of devils, that the world no longer exists for our delectation, demands that we do something few people in the rich world have done for many years: recognize that progress now depends upon the exercise of few opportunities. . .
. . . I have sought the means of proving otherwise, not least because it would make my task of persuading people to adopt the proposals in this book much easier. But it has become plain to me that long-distance travel, high speed and the curtailment of climate change are not compatible. If you fly, you destroy people’s lives.”
Song o’ the Day is one of my all-time faves, “Burning Airlines” by Brian Eno. Try it, you’ll like it. I promise. [audio:eno.mp3]
Artwork: 2004 Zoe Charlton
air-travel, climate-change, george-monbiot, global-warming
Tags: environment, Inconveniences
Hey Tod,
While I totally agree that flying is a terrible burden (it is my highest contributor to my personal footprint), I also really struggle with how to overcome the problem.
I usually purchase offsets for my flights, but as spoken about here in other posts - that isn’t the best way to reduce our impacts.
I guess it just puts the question of how badly we want to have 90 percent reduction (or as close as we can get). Are we willing to sacrifice globalisation?
Thanks for the food for thought as I prepare to fly to Japan, which by the way the flight (one way) emits more CO2 per passenger than the UN recommendation for one family per year.
Yikes!
sayonara. larryO
Larry -
I feel ya, pal. Carbon offsets are a bit sketchy, but I have to endorse the conversation they create, if nothing else. I have my TerraPass sticker but it doesn’t make me feel like I’ve ‘done the right thing’ only that I now have a sticker that may one day provoke a conversation wtih someone about why, exactly, I feel a need to reduce my footprint, whether it be symbolically or otherwise. To date, the only person who has asked me about it is a guy who was a lawyer for TerraPass when it was incorporated.
Believe me, I don’t want to give up my dreams of visiting Egypt, Iran, much of Africa, my family in Australia and Hawaii. However, as Monbiot points out, sooner or later we’ll have to get used to a different way of life. We can’t pretend that nothing is going to change.
It’s a very difficult conundrum. Yet, I can’t pretend it doesn’t exist. Ultimately, I have come to realize that, if I don’t have an answer, I cannot in good conscious roll the dice and proceed “as was” in the hope that science will save us. I have to change my behavior now and, if we’re all lucky, I’ll have the amazing luxury of flying again down the road. Of course, that said, I’m certain I’ll break down and get on a transcontinental flight one day because I simply don’t have the will to do otherwise and that, frankly, convinces me that we’re all fucked.
I type this a bit down on rum and totally depressed by a waste of three hours of my life - the new Pirate Depp movie - a sorries sack of shitty storytelling was never, ever put on the big screen. The fact that the audience clapped at the end convinced me (again) that we’re going to hell in a handbasket. Heh.
Tod, You’re right, we need to give up flying. I like the vision in David Korten’s “When Corporations Rule the World.” The opposite of corporate rule is regional, not global, economies, large enough to produce everything that region needs, which doesn’t include airplanes.
I don’t care how anyone slices or dices it, flying is bad for the environment. Even Al Gore is going to need to learn to stay clower to home.
Where are the bullet trains in the US? I’m not well versed on how good or bad they score on the environmental report card, but its almost as expensive to take a train from NYC to Boston as it is to fly, and they can’t possibly be as bad as flying for the environment right? Is there some lobby preventing bullet trains from spanning the US?
Danny -
Yes, of course there is anti-train lobbying. Has been for years and years. Oil companies have purchased our best train lines and subways and removed them since the turn of the century.
Many plans exist for bullet trains in the U.S., most notably a line that would connect SF with LA. To date, they’ve been squashed. I worked hard trying to get a line in my area, lost by 2% at the polls. The anti-train lobby is fierce and well-funded. . .not just auto and oil but contractors, cement companies, you name it.
Our current trains, especially where you are, totally suck and it’s too bad. Part of the reason it is hard to get public support for faster trains is the experience with existing lines is poor.
Mass transit needs to be more comfortable, more luxurious. It doesn’t cost much more to build a nice subway car or a wi-fi equipped train with comfortable seats and edible food.
Todd, do us all a favor. If you want to fly, go ahead. If you consider flying bad, stay on the ground (don’t pretend your car does less damage than a plane, because it doesn’t). But don’t step into a system that better men and women than you have given years of their lives (and sometimes their lives) to make safe, and then humiliate yourself and insult them by trashing it.
The numbers say that we can keep our planes and survive, but not our cars (3% for aviation, 17% for the car, and while contrails may increase the heat, poisoning thousands of square mils with roads certainly does). Someone who drives 35 miles to work each does more harm to the environment than someone who cycles or takes the train and flies to London on holiday every year.
That doesn’t mean we should not look for more carbon-free ways to travel. It certainly does not mean we should simply expand air travel or any other activity without regard for the consequences. But the time has come for lose the pretense that we can keep our cars if we agree to feel really guilty about flying; in fact, the time as come to admit that the biosphere does not care about our feelings at all, and to make effective decisions about our transportation based on the facts and logic. And hard as you may find this, sometimes (as in going into remote communities) airplanes offer the most carbon-neutral form of transportation available.
John -
I\’ve no problem with the men and women of the aviation industry, nor am I stepping on them. YOUR numbers say we can keep aviation, wheras the numbers I come across that also take into account projected growth DO NOT. To me, it\’s better safe than sorry so I\’m going with my numbers. I agree with you that limited annual flights do less harm, but it isn\’t about more vs. less, it\’s about finding an equation that solves the problem, not one that gets closer to the goal than we are now but fails to cross the line. Better isn\’t good enough.
We\’re on the same page, mate. Cars have to go. Our cities must be rebuilt to. . .oh, just read the top post here that links to a much better blog and you\’ll see that you and are seeing eye to eye (other than that jets do not offer the most carbon-neutral form of travel!)
Also, thanks for taking the time to present your thoughts. Well formed, insightful and constructive. Much appreciated, they are.
Have you seen this yet?
http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/AR/archive/jul01/jet0701.htm
I’ve seen info on this. Sorry I can’t turn that into a link for some reason. My site is being iffy.
The biggest hurdle with biofuels is that aside from the fact they drive up food costs, due to the intensification of farming needed to produce the huge volumes of sawgrass, cane, corn or what have you, and all the machinery associated with harvesting, processing and delivery, they tend have the potential to produce MORE global warming in the end. Best case scenario they reduce emissions, but only slightly - certainly not in the neighborhood of the 90% we’re going to need.
Look, I don’t want to be a naysayer, and everything I say could be total bullshit as I don’t know this stuff firsthand, I just scour sources looking for likely accurate answers. Maybe biofuels in jets is the answer. . .but given what I think I know, it doesn’t seem right.
(I’m going to scoop up these comments and put them over in the jet fuel post.)
“If you fly, you destroy people’s lives.â€
That was written shortly before he took a transatlantic flight to Canada to promote his book.
Ha! I don’t know about Monbiot’s travel habits, but I know Kunstler feels much the same way and complains bitterly when he takes flights.
Your point, I understand. However, our personal hypocrisies have nothing to do with the accuracy of the message.
Were I to have written it, I would have said, “When we fly, we destroy people’s lives.” Solves the issue and maintains the power of the statement.
“Global warming means that flying across the Atlantic is now as unacceptable as child abuse.”
-George Monbiot, 1999