Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Forum to produce a report 'Travel and Tourism in a Low Carbon Economy',
which was their contribution to the Copenhagen process in December 2009.
The World Economic Forum (2009) report recommended modal shift from
car to mass-transit modes as part of the solution. But it is interesting to note
that it did not propose a shift from air travel to other modes. With regard to
aviation strategy it recommended a push for the inclusion of aviation in post-
Kyoto climate change agreements at an international level.
International legislation and regulation relating to climate change has
been gathering pace in recent years. Post-Kyoto, the EU, as a whole, agreed
to meet a joint target of an 8 per cent reduction in GHG emissions below
1990 levels by 2012, with greater and lesser targets allocated to different
member states to meet the overall reduction. In 2000, the European
Commission launched the European Climate Change Programme that
resulted in the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS), one of the key mech-
anisms to achieve GHG reduction in the EU. More recently, various EU states
have unilaterally set emissions targets based on the aim of stabilizing CO
2
equivalent concentrations in the atmosphere to avoid dangerous climate
change; that is, a global average temperature rise not exceeding 2ºC above
pre-industrial levels. Stabilizing CO
2
equivalent at around 450 parts per mil-
lion by volume (ppmv) provides a 46 per cent chance of ensuring global mean
temperatures do not exceed the 2ºC threshold. However, stabilizing a CO
2
equivalent at 550ppmv provides only a 29 per cent chance (Bows et al,
2009b). Current CO
2
levels are 384.78ppmv, as of September 2009 (Tyndall
Centre for Climate Change Research, 2009).
In 2007, the European Commission proposed a target of a GHG emission
reduction of 60 to 80 per cent by 2050 from a 1990 benchmark (COM, 2007).
This target has been adopted in UK legislation (Department for Environment
Food and Rural Affairs, 2009). In December 2008, EU leaders agreed a cli-
mate change action and renewable energy package. This was a unilateral
agreement to reduce GHG emissions by 20 per cent by 2020 compared to
1990 levels, with a commitment to 30 per cent reductions if there is a wider
international agreement to reduce GHG emissions (COM, 2009a).
The Kyoto Protocol encouraged countries to account for emissions from
international aviation, but these are reported separately to those within
national borders (Becken and Hay, 2007), excluded from binding targets and
therefore outside of emissions trading.
Air transport is a significant obstacle to the tourism sector's attempts to
achieve emissions reductions (Janic, 1999). The principal reason is that avia-
tion is currently excluded from national and international policy on GHG
emission reductions. This is for a variety of historical reasons linked to the
problem of attributing fuel use, and hence aviation fuel taxation, to particu-
lar countries, given the international nature of air travel. Shipping is also
excluded for similar reasons (Michaelova and Krause, 2000).
Bows et al (2009b) have analysed the aviation contribution to emissions
targets in the context of the EU. The current EU target does not include the
emissions generated by either international aviation or shipping, although the
EU Commission now considers that these sectors should be included (COM,
