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Air Travel Emissions Vastly Outpace Predictions

nytimes.com

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Re: Air Travel Emissions Vastly Outpace Predictions

#111

Post by bennofs »

csallen wrote: post #16
Symmetry wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It depends on who you are. The median person doesn't fly. But a round trip flight from Shanghai to New York is 3.4 tons of carbon, pretty close to the average global anual per capita emissions of 4.0 tons.

Seems implausible to me that this is a problem that's going to be solved by asking people to make personal sacrifices. The numbers don't add up. When the op says, "we should focus on…" I assume he's talking about policy, technology, etc., not individual concessions. The best argument I can imagine for encouraging individual concessions is that, if the campaign to do so is massively successful, it might create a new n…

On the other hand, it also seems implausible to me that the problem can be solved if everyone on the world would produce a few tones of carbon emissions each year by flying. So either flights need to become so expensive that they remain a privilege for the rich or they need to be limited in some other way.

I agree that flights are perhaps not the most urgent issue. But encouraging people to fly more is still wrong. When possible, we should avoid flights.

Re: Air Travel Emissions Vastly Outpace Predictions

#113

Post by tombert »

bjelkeman-again wrote: post #109
tombert wrote: post #86

I fly fairly frequently to California from NY for work, lately after reading a few articles like this, I wonder if I should put my foot down to my manager and tell them that I'm not going to anymore until flying is less terrible for the atmosphere. I don't think I'll be fired for that, and even if I were I'd probably be able to find another job without too much trouble at this point, but I feel a bit bad for people d…

I did change. I dropped from 35-40 flights in 12 months (really not good, in more ways than one) to 3-4. Still too many. But getting there.

I think people are too quick to dismiss incremental progress; you dropped by 90%, that sounds pretty excellent to me!

Re: Air Travel Emissions Vastly Outpace Predictions

#114

Post by AprilArcus »

Maximus9000 wrote: post #81
phkahler wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Air travel is more important because of the water vapor far more than the carbon. The week following 9/11 was dramatically different. NASA recorded the change in daily temperature range. Less significantly, we had crystal clear skys where I live - for a week! Water vapor can also seed cloud formation. Air travel causes a daily cycle in this, which might just keep more heat in at night. You can look at data and see th…

> "The week following 9/11 was dramatically different. NASA recorded the change in daily temperature range. Less significantly, we had crystal clear skys where I live - for a week!" Do you have links for this?

Minnis, Patrick, J. Kirk Ayers, Rabindra Palikonda, and Dung Phan, 2004. "Contrails, Cirrus Trends, and Climate". Journal of Climate Vol. 17, No 8, pp. 1671-1685, April 15, 2004

doi:10.1175/1520-0442(2004)0172.0.co;2

https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/pdf/10.1175/1520-0442%28200...

Re: Air Travel Emissions Vastly Outpace Predictions

#115

Post by kaybe »

tombert wrote: post #86

I fly fairly frequently to California from NY for work, lately after reading a few articles like this, I wonder if I should put my foot down to my manager and tell them that I'm not going to anymore until flying is less terrible for the atmosphere. I don't think I'll be fired for that, and even if I were I'd probably be able to find another job without too much trouble at this point, but I feel a bit bad for people d…

If you can't stop completely that easily reducing would also be a good start and maybe easier to achieve.

edit: Another parameter you have control over is the amount of luggage you bring. A 30kg luggage allowance is a considerable fraction of most people's weight. Sure, they will fill the plane up with other things, but at least that's not on you.

Re: Air Travel Emissions Vastly Outpace Predictions

#116

Post by quotemstr »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #98
quotemstr wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These guys seem to have a viable approach to accelerated weathering, a form of carbon removal: https://projectvesta.org/

I skimmed their site and I'm yet to read the whitepaper, but I have one question that wasn't so far answered: what about transportation costs? Is this still net carbon negative when you account for the costs of moving all this rock and spreading it on the beaches?

They discuss that in their detailed proposals. There's a lot of discussion on siting and various transportation options. The math ends up working out.

Re: Air Travel Emissions Vastly Outpace Predictions

#118

Post by ebrewste »

Maximus9000 wrote: post #81
phkahler wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Air travel is more important because of the water vapor far more than the carbon. The week following 9/11 was dramatically different. NASA recorded the change in daily temperature range. Less significantly, we had crystal clear skys where I live - for a week! Water vapor can also seed cloud formation. Air travel causes a daily cycle in this, which might just keep more heat in at night. You can look at data and see th…

> "The week following 9/11 was dramatically different. NASA recorded the change in daily temperature range. Less significantly, we had crystal clear skys where I live - for a week!" Do you have links for this?

I remember hearing about this at the time. Some links I just looked up:

https://www.int-res.com/articles/cr2002/cr2004/26/c026p001.p...

https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/contrail-effect/

Re: Air Travel Emissions Vastly Outpace Predictions

#119

Post by egdod »

j-pb wrote: post #101

If I take the train, which is the most green transport (CO2 neutral) from one edge of europe to the other (e.g. Berlin to Sicily), the amount I pay is 500 euros and it takes me 35 hours. If I fly the same distance it takes me 3 hours, and I pay 100 euros. Heres the kicker, it costs me 100 euro to buy CO2 compensation and make the flight CO2 neutral, and whenever me and my spouse fly we always pay twice that so that w…

Where do you buy your carbon offsets? What actually happens to the money that you spend on them?

Re: Air Travel Emissions Vastly Outpace Predictions

#120

Post by alex_young »

j-pb wrote: post #101

If I take the train, which is the most green transport (CO2 neutral) from one edge of europe to the other (e.g. Berlin to Sicily), the amount I pay is 500 euros and it takes me 35 hours. If I fly the same distance it takes me 3 hours, and I pay 100 euros. Heres the kicker, it costs me 100 euro to buy CO2 compensation and make the flight CO2 neutral, and whenever me and my spouse fly we always pay twice that so that w…

That sounds great, but how do you manage to offset 2 flights? I don't really understand how money can undo putting a bunch of carbon in the atmosphere.
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