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Rutherford has diligently tracked his own carbon footprint and calculated that on the days he flies, his footprint multiplies 75-fold. “It’s a really easy way to burn multiple barrels of oil in a given day in one fell swoop,” says Dan Rutherford, director of aviation programs for the International Council on Clean Transportation, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit research group. But the fact that thousands of gallons are burnt on a typical domestic flight, and tens of thousands on international flights, racks up emissions quickly. It’s not that jet fuel is especially carbon-heavy burning a gallon of it produces 9.57 kilograms of CO2, comparable to gasoline at 8.89 kg per gallon. Pound-for-pound, over a short period of time, few human activities generate climate-altering gases with as much gusto as aviation. Yet where the climate-conscious - flight-shamers included - might have a point is with aviation’s relative intensity of emissions and the sector’s projected emissions growth. The company is designing supersonic airliners that will “remove the barriers to experiencing the planet,” as he put it in a presentation at AIAA’s SciTech Forum in January. Joe Wilding, chief technology officer at Boom Supersonic in Colorado, says the shaming is a “bit unfair” because it discounts the societal benefits of air travel. You get on a metal tube and you’re flying through the air, burning hydrocarbons.” “You don’t see the consequences of your actions,” says Aboulafia. A big reason is perception goofing off on Facebook from the comfort of one’s own smartphone is not as obvious as hurtling along at 35,000 feet. Yet data centers and the online services they undergird do not receive anywhere near the level of criticism and scrutiny as aviation, Aboulafia says. Richard Aboulafia, an analyst with the Virginia-based Teal Group points out that data centers worldwide are estimated to contribute an even bigger share, closer to 3%.

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“Companies and people are strategically positioning themselves for how to handle this, so definitely one of the more urgent issues for this decade.” Easy target emissionsĪviation industry executives see undue finger-pointing given their sector’s relatively small slice of the greenhouse gas emissions pie - right around 2.5%. The movement might succeed in coalescing long-standing concerns of aviation’s environmental impact, possibly leading to significant business changes that then inevitably lead to technological changes.įlight shaming is “suddenly a thing,” says Brian Foley, founder of the aerospace-focused consultancy Brian Foley Associates. The rise of flight shaming could prove a pivotal moment in the trajectory of the aviation industry. In response, airline companies and aviation advocacy organizations have defended their record and made multiple gestures acknowledging they’ve heard passengers’ concerns. Several European countries are eyeing legislation to promote train travel while making flight taxes more punitive for ordinary flyers. Commercial airline passenger numbers have downticked in Sweden, for instance.

What is striking, however, is that flight shaming is having a discernible impact - and not, as one might expect, on the perennially easy target of the wealthy flying in business jets, but on average air travelers. Now one of the latest Swedish exports to go global is “flygskam” or “flight shaming,” a reference to the guilt that some airline passengers feel about the environmental impact of their flying, particularly over aviation’s carbon dioxide emissions that contribute to planetary warming.Ĭatchily branded eco-consciousness is nothing new, of course, and aviation has long been caught in green crosshairs. Adam Hadhazy checks in with environmentalists and the aviation industry.įor a country of barely 10 million people, Sweden has a history of punching above its weight, bestowing upon the world such household names as IKEA, Volvo and ABBA. Now it looks like flight shaming is not going away and could even begin impacting aircraft designs. When the trend of air travelers feeling guilty about their carbon footprints first arose, it seemed to some in the U.S.

Flight shaming’s surprising power By Adam Hadhazy | April 2020

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