People fly less because of COVID-19. Will they fly less because of climate change?
By: Brandon Pytel
Tags: Airlines, Climate Action, Environment, Flying, Climate Change

People are avoiding airports like, well, the plague.

With crowds, long lines, and frequently touched surfaces, airports can increase the spread of COVID-19. And though airplanes generally have good circulation, “social distancing is difficult on crowded flights, and sitting within 6 feet of others, sometimes for hours, may increase your risk of getting COVID-19.”

People are taking heed of these dangers. This year, global air travel is projected to fall 60–70% compared to 2019. And because flights account for about 2.5% of global carbon emissions, this high-emitting victim of the pandemic is part of the reason global emissions have fallen in 2020.

Obviously, a pandemic is the last way we want to cut our emissions. But we can still learn from our current flight aversion. Specifically, how we view flights right now — as dangerous hubs of risk and potential death — teaches us how we must view flights in the future. After all, air travel directly contributes to the climate crisis, which will kill far more people than the pandemic.

The recent United Nations’ Emissions Gap Report found that we’re barreling toward three degrees of warming. Much of the blame lies at the feet of the world’s wealthiest — emissions of the richest 1% of the global population account for twice the share of the poorest 50%. A big driver of that inequity is flying, with 1% of people responsible for half of global airline emissions, accounting for $100 billion of climate damage in 2018.

Of course, we’ve known the climate risk of flying for a while now. Flying is so bad for the Planet that it spurred a now-popular Swedish word: flygstam, or literally “flight shame.”

Amid an out-of-control pandemic, flying seems even more stigmatized. When one of our friends recently traveled by plane, most people questioned her decision and refused to see her until she isolated, or at least tested negative for the virus. And upon recently coming home for the holidays, I did all I could to avoid airports, at one point even considering a $600 rental car (I ended up getting a ride with a friend in my bubble).

In other words, when outlined as a significant risk to yourself and others, flying seems avoidable. Stigmatizing flying, however, isn’t the healthiest, or most sustainable, way of getting people to fly less, according to Frank Maisano, a senior principal at Bracewell LLP, who works with energy companies.

“Shaming people and nations and demanding they change never has or will work,” Maisano recently told The Washington Post. “What is necessary is creating modestly increasing political, technology and cultural successes that build upon each other to create meaningful overall change.”

Part of that cultural success is changing the conversation around flying to something that can be avoided or even substituted. For example, a six-hour car ride through the Appalachian mountains with a friend is more rewarding than a 90-minute flight muted by a podcast.

And technically speaking, there have been meaningful breakthroughs in hydrogen-powered planes and all-electric flights — good news considering flying emissions are expected to triple by 2050. Given the urgency of our climate crisis, however, these innovations are unlikely to be a silver-bullet solution. We’ll still need to find ways to fly less.

2020 has been a hell of a year, and we’re all craving a return to normalcy. But life before wasn’t perfect either. And hitting the reset button presents an opportunity to create a newer, better life, one that doesn’t rely on all the wasteful emissions of yesterday.

Not flying is one way to start.