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Aircraft Responsible For 2.5% of Global Carbon Dioxide Emissions
jIyajbe writes: Christie Aschwanden of FiveThirtyEight.com reports that the world's aircraft are responsible for roughly 2.5% of global carbon dioxide emissions. The industry as a whole puts out more CO2 than most countries, and emissions are expected to grow significantly over the next few decades. She writes, "Planes don't just release carbon dioxide, they also emit nitrogen oxides, sulfur oxides and black carbon, as well as water vapor that can form heat-trapping clouds... These emissions take place in the upper troposphere, where their effects are magnified. When this so-called radiative forcing effect is taken into account, aviation emissions produce about 2.7 times the warming effects of CO2 alone." A related article breaks down how much each airline pollutes, relative to the others. Alaska, Spirit, and Frontier are tied for the highest fuel efficiency score, while American beats out Allegiant Air and Sun Country for the lowest spot.
The cool thing about economics, however, is that there is enormous economic demand to do so. This means if we can put an emissions tax on airlines, there is an incredible incentive to make technological advances that significantly decrease emissions. When that happens, we will still be able to meet demand for relatively low cost.
I agree with the idea, but it's not a "simple fact"; coming to that conclusion requires a long argument involving a lot of scientific reasoning, experience, the particulars of our status quo of technology, population, and environmental inputs, and a certain (if reasonable) valuation of the potential trade-offs.
Proper environmentalism isn't "simple facts" - because it's not a religion of Earth purity. It's about legitimately complicated choices and consequences, and evaluating those choices over a longer term.
Let's not stir that bag of worms...
Figure it that way (even with the multiplier for altitude effects). Then get back to me.
Atmosfair, a German organization that sells "offsets"
I thought I disabled ads.
P.S. In my day, we called them indulgences, not offsets.
Have gnu, will travel.
The simple fact is Globalism is bad for the globe.
In the end it really does not matter what you are moving, the people, the goods, or both. It does not much matter how you are moving it, planes, trains, autos, freighters, or sail boats.
Fundamentally transportation is overhead. If your goal is to maximize the sustainable population (and I am not sure that actually is noble pursuit) than the solution will always be to find ways people can get things they need without having to move, and created out of local resources. Which does not mean you start growing rice in the desert, it means your find a substitute for rice that can be produced efficiently locally.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
It all depends on the problem you're trying to solve. You're right- industries would be disrupted. It is an unfortunate side-effect of any industry moving in any direction.
It is my belief that the government has the right to impose taxes to compensate for negative externalities. Pollution and emissions are prime examples of this.
I strongly agree with Milton Friedman on this issue. Primarily, that it isn't simple or easy to solve, but also that when the government intervenes it shouldn't be through regulation or standards, it should be through a straightforward tax to pay for the costs. That's why if you had an emissions tax it would have to follow a number of basic guidelines:
1. It cannot be transferable or creditable. The entity is taxed only for its emissions, and only based upon the quantity of emissions.
2. It must be used for one of two purposes: either mechanisms to clean up the pollution and emissions, or research into more efficient and cleaner sources of energy.
3. The tax should slightly outweigh the cost for companies to reduce their emissions themselves. When a CFO looks at a balance sheet, he should see he can either fork out $50,000 for a much better engine or $51,000 for taxes on the emissions from the worse engine.
The fuel economy might be comparable, but we are talking about emissions, not fuel economy. Cars have catalytic converters that scrub all kinds of nasty stuff, stuff worse than CO2, from the emissions. Jets have no such thing, the fuel is combusted in open air, and all the emissions are propelled out of the back, no filtration.
Additionally, as mentioned in these Slashdot comments, the pollutants are more damaging when released at 35,000 feet than at ground level.