The International Civil Aviation Organization estimates that the demand for air transport is growing 5 per cent every year and could double in less than 15 years. Aircraft give off about 2.7 per cent of the world's carbon dioxide emissions, contributing to 1.5 per cent of global warming. This figure may seem small, but at the rate the airline industry is growing, it is a pollution crisis in the making. So the environmental damage caused by aeroplanes is still relatively limited. Should it grow to this extent, and if scientists' predictions about global warming hold true, a number of conditions will need to be met.
Air travel is here to stay.
North Americans fly the most, with people travelling an average 1,700 kilometres per year by. In Africa, the average is 45 kilometres per person. British Airways has had an environmental programme since 1989, and last year published its second Annual Environmental Report which candidly admits that in 1992-1993, British Airways planes produced 11.6 million tonnes of CO2 and 44,000 tonnes of NOx a 6 per cent increase from the previous year. Swissair's NOx emissions rose only 2 per cent from 1989 to 1992. When calculated with the rise in number of passengers and distance flown, emissions actually dropped 7 per cent.