British Airways chief executive Willie Walsh was scheduled to tell world leaders at the UN climate summit yesterday that the aviation industry could halve its carbon dioxide emissions by 2050, a spokesman for the airline said on Monday.
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) agreed to the ambitious target to cut sector emissions to 50 percent below 2005 levels by 2050 at its annual general meeting in June.
Britain’s Committee on Climate Change said this month flights could produce up to a fifth of all global carbon dioxide emissions by 2050, from about 2 percent now, without urgent and drastic action.
PHOTO: EPA
IATA says a global carbon emissions permit trading system should be introduced to encourage cuts, rather than slapping more taxes on air travel.
“Carbon trading gives airlines a direct incentive to reduce their emissions. Flight taxes, such as Air Passenger Duty, do not,” British Airways said in a statement. “Taxation guarantees no emissions reductions whatever, and does not necessarily provide any revenue for environmental objectives.”
World leaders were to meet at the UN in New York yesterday for a one-day summit to try to unlock 190-nation negotiations on a new deal to combat global warming due to be hammered out in Copenhagen in December.
IATA also agreed in June to cap carbon emissions from aviation from 2020, and aim for an average improvement in fuel efficiency of 1.5 percent per year from this year to 2020.
Meanwhile, General Electric Co and BP Plc are demanding governments enact regulations to cut emissions blamed for global warming and create a worldwide carbon market to ensure developing nations slow pollution growth.
GE, the biggest maker of power-plant equipment, and BP, Europe’s second-largest oil company, joined other multinational manufacturers and service providers demanding leaders agree to cut emissions 85 percent by 2050. They also want rules to keep developing countries from logging tropical forests and money to help the poor adapt to a warming planet.
Without a global pact, industry will suffer from “uncertainty,” the firms said in a statement that was also signed by Coca-Cola, Starbucks, BASF and Rio Tinto.
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