UK Thinks Rationing Flights Will Solve Its CO2 Problems

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An environmental group that works closely with the UK government has introduced an idea that isn’t likely to win it too many friends: ration air travel. If implemented, the plan would allow British travelers an annual quota of short haul flights, with flights exceeding that allotment likely to get taxed at progressively higher rates.

This harebrained idea is just the latest attempt by the UK to come to grips with its self imposed carbon reduction targets, some of the most aggressive in the world. Hitting them will require that emissions in 2050 come in below those of 2005 – no easy feat. That has the government proposing anything and everything that might cut down on CO2.

“We will have to constrain demand in an absolute sense, with people not allowed to make as many journeys as they could in an unconstrained manner,” said Adair Turner, chairman of the Committee on Climate Change the day he proposed the rationing idea to Parliament. He argued that there was “no reason at all why people should fly around the UK,” and suggested that domestic flights be taxed so heavily that they essentially disappear.

Huh?

The Committee on Climate change describes itself as “an independent body established under the Climate Change Act to advise the UK Government on setting carbon budgets, and to report to Parliament on the progress made in reducing greenhouse gas emissions.” The group is made up of academics, technocrats, and a sprinkling of industry executives. Lord Turner, who took the reins of the group last year, previously worked for Chase Manhattan, McKinsey & Co., and Merrill Lynch.

Critics of his idea were quick to shoot it down.

“The UK’s emissions are insignificant compared to China and India,” Kendra Okonski of the the International Policy Network pointed out to the Daily Mail. “We will impose costs on our economy which will harm the poor, but do nothing to help the climate.”

Flying Matters, a coalition of aviation-related groups, was also quick to show its displeasure. “One always suspects with these half-baked proposals that the people who put them forward really intend them to apply to ordinary people, many of whom have only recently gained access to air travel, rather than to themselves,” it said in a wordy statement. Not a surprising stance considering that the group’s members include British Airways, Boeing, Airbus, and the Airport Operators Association.

But the government doesn’t appear to be on board either. In response to the recommendations, Transportation Secretary Norman Baker said that “there is an absolute need to recognise (sic) the serious climate change implications of aviation but Forties-style rationing is not the way forward.”

The UK is going to have to work hard to hit its aggressive emissions targets, but we agree with Baker. Rationing is definitely not the way to move forward.