Climate Change News
Below are news items on climate change – many with relevance to aviation
Airbus tries to get inclusion of aviation in ETS suspended. EU confirms no change.
There have been press stories suggesting that European officials backing Airbus are recommending the suspension of ETS in order to avert a trade war with major economic powers such as China and the USA. China and India do not allow their airlines to participate in the ETS because the charge is for the whole flight distance, not just the section over Europe. Beijing has blocked purchases of European aircraft (Airbus) by its carriers, so Airbus is unhappy about losing its fastest-growing market and is putting strong pressure on the EU as they may lose plane sales. Those backing Airbus want a "solution" before April 2013, but the matter is not due to be dealt with by ICAO till September 2013. Connie Hedegaard has confirmed that there are "no changes in EU and member states approach on the ETS and aviation" and this is just pressure from Airbus. The EU has repeatedly said it won’t give up its pollution curbs on airlines.
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Can the UK fly more without breaking climate change targets?
The aviation industry is bullish about its prospects of decoupling growth in aviation from the growth in emissions. At least Boeing and BAA are, and a host of airlines and airports that are part of the "Sustainable Aviation Council". The SAC's 2012 roadmap argues that virtually all of the extra GHG that would be emitted by this rise can be cut by a combination of sleeker aircraft, leaner engines, smoother ground operations, more direct flight paths and up to 40% use of biofuels in global aviation. It also suggests that the use of carbon trading would mean aviation's current carbon footprint could be halved even if passenger numbers more than doubled. But aircraft emissions cannot be airbrushed away through carbon trading, as Tim Yeo and others suggest. Given a new dash for gas in the UK, new road building and then more aviation, where are the CO2 cuts needed for permits to trade actually going to come from? Damian Carrington explores the issues.
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China buys 50 Airbus A329-family jets during Merkel visit despite ETS dispute
China signed an agreement with Germany for 50 Airbus planes worth up to $4 billion during Angela Merkel's visit to Beijing. This is the first significant order since a dispute over the ETS. The dispute between Beijing and the EU had allegedly interrupted earlier deals worth up to $14 billion. The Chinese news agency said China's ICBC Leasing and Airbus, whose parent company is Franco-German-led aerospace group EADS, signed the deal for 50 Airbus A320-family planes. China regularly orders aircraft in large batches timed to coincide with high-level contacts with US or EU leaders, but this deal apparently fell short of European expectations of a 100-plane order. Airbus and Chinese authorities also signed a $1.6 billion deal to extend an Airbus A320 assembly line at Tianjin. China continues to block the purchase of some 35 larger Airbus aircraft to protest against the ETS.
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Impact of contrails on climate
At present, there is no agreed figure for the amount of climate altering effect that is produced by aircraft at high altitude, including cirrus cloud formed by contrails, in addition to the effect of CO2 they emit. The UK government uses a multiplier of 1.9 for this extra impact by planes. An article in New Scientist in August 2011 presented evidence from a German scientist that contrail cirrus ended up covering 0.6% of Earth's surface – an area 9 times as great as that covered by line contrails as they emerge from the planes. The Germany researcher then used this figure to produce a more accurate estimate of the total energy trapped by contrails. Her calculations suggest a global figure of 31 mW/m2 – higher than that attributable to aviation CO2.
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Why Tim Yeo is wrong about carbon emissions from UK aviation being controlled by the ETS
This piece from the Carbon Brief sets out how the carbon emissions from UK aviation are dealt with by the ETS, and why Tim Yeo (and others promoting huge expansion of UK air travel, beyond the limit recommended by the Committee on Climate Change), have got it wrong. Besides the apparent misunderstanding about the failings of the ETS, Yeo also suggested that that if the UK were to increase its airport capacity, carriers would be more likely to send their newer, more efficient planes to Heathrow. Carbon Brief explains that this would not happen as there doesn't seem to be any reason why airlines would send their newest planes to the UK over other EU destinations. If the ETS works as it is meant to, the price of carbon permits would go up, so the cost of flying would go up. And the UK would have to either cut down on aviation demand (very unlikely) or overstep its emissions cap, as no government would be popular if it tried to ration air travel.
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Why Tim Yeo is wrong on aviation and the EU ETS
This is an article from BusinessGreen, with a good and clear explanation of why Tim Yeo is utterly wrong with his pronouncements on aviation and the ETS. You would have thought someone who is Chair of the Energy and Climate Change Select Committee should know this. The ETS cannot and will not prevent aviation emissions from rising, because of the current weakness and failures of the ETS, meaning it does not work properly, largely as the carbon price is too low and dubious credits are imported from outside. However, supposing the ETS did work perfectly, it would drive up the cost of flying hugely as permits become scarce and expensive as carbon cuts are harder and harder for other sectors to make. There would then be no need for more runways as demand would fall greatly. So no need for a new Heathrow runway, or a new airport. Unless planes could become virtually zero carbon - of which there is no current prospect.
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Retaliation On Airline Carbon May Breach Law: says Cambridge researcher
A Cambridge University researcher has given the opinion that nations which retaliate against the EU ETS may fall foul of international trade rules and the WTO. The researcher, who is a lecturer in WTO and international law, said: “If a World Trade Organization member restricts EU flights over its territory, or landing slots for EU flights in its territory, it is likely to violate WTO obligations ensuring non- discriminatory treatment of trade in goods, as well as freedom of transit.” They noticed the irony of Russia, which only joined the WTO yesterday, immediately trying to use trade restrictions for political purposes. The researcher said the WTO permits measures that are necessary “to protect human, animal or plant life or health,” and a successful WTO complaint against the ETS would have to show that the EU could have achieved the same goal another way that is “both reasonably available and less trade- restrictive than the measure adopted. This is notoriously difficult to assess".
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US Senate Panel passes Bill to shield US airlines from EU ETS
A Senate committee has passed a bill authorising the transportation secretary to bar US airlines from complying with the ETS if he or she deems this to be in the public interest. It will now be sent to the full Senate for a vote. The 19-member panel voted to approve an updated version of a bipartisan bill authored by Republican Senator John Thune and Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill. They want this to apply more pressure on the EU to stand down from what they say is "a misguided and unlawful tax" and claim the money spent in paying for carbon emissions could "otherwise be invested in creating jobs and stimulating economic growth in our country.” It will require the secretary to hold a public hearing before implementing any ban, and also “to pursue a worldwide approach” to address aircraft emissions (ie. the glacially slow, and so far utterly ineffective ICAO process).
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Change of direction promised by US on international aviation inclusion in EU ETS
A group of 16 countries (so far un-named) are meeting in the US about the ETS, and how a global "solution" might be found to aviation emissions. The opponents of the ETS, even though it adds so very little to a trans-Atlantic flight ($3 or so one way) want ICAO to come up with some scheme that is global. However, if ICAO can ever agree a scheme, it will both take years to bring about, and is likely to be too weak to be effective. ICAO's only target now is an "aspirational" one (meaning not binding at all) to keep global aviation emissions at 2020 levels, after 2020, by buying offsets for increases. Annie Petsonk of US NGO Environmental Defense Fund said yesterday the US airlines’ and their trade association’s motive was “to tie up ICAO so deeply in the ponderous process that it will never have time to work on a serious agreement on climate change.”
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Breakthrough on efforts to reduce emissions from aircraft
Efforts to tackle emissions from aviation have taken a hesitant step forward, with the news that ICAO has endorsed an expert group’s recommendation on the way to measure fuel burn in flight. The recommendation is for a ‘metric’ system and test cycle to be the basis for setting fuel efficiency standards for new aircraft. However, many concerns remain. In 2009, ICAO began work on a standard for new aircraft, and has now produced a methodology for measuring in-flight fuel burn and thus CO2 emissions. This will form the basis for a minimum standard of fuel efficiency that all new aircraft will have to meet on CO2 emissions. The ICAO proposal for the CO2 metric are not yet public. The environmental groups working with ICAO are working to ensure the standard set is stringent enough.