An environmental lobby group has dismissed the International Civil Aviation Organisation’s (ICAO’s) global carbon offset scheme as “climate fraud” and “a non‑starter” for addressing aviation’s greenhouse gas emissions.
ICAO, the UN agency charged with cutting global air travel emissions, launched the pilot phase of its Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (Corsia) last year.
It will meet in Montreal this week for an assembly of 193 member states with a remit to set a non-binding Long-Term Aspirational Goal (LTAG) to cut aviation’s carbon emissions.
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But according to Brussels-based lobby group Transport & Environment (T&E), Corsia would add a carbon offset charge of just €2.40 to the price of an average Europe-US flight in 2030 and €2 to a London-New York flight.
The group argued such amounts are “inadequate considering the cost of decarbonising aviation” and denounced the scheme as “greenwash”.
T&E aviation director Jo Dardenne described offsetting as “a climate fraud perpetrated by an industry resisting real climate action” and said: “Paying €2 to fly ‘guilt-free’ to New York is a climate absurdity. Corsia is a non-starter for our heating planet.”
Corsia is based on airlines offsetting their growth in emissions above a baseline, currently set at the level of 2019 – a record year for air travel.
T&E calculated Corsia would offset 8.6 million tonnes of CO2 for all the flights from Europe to the US in 2030 when the predicted growth in air traffic would see 23.5 million tonnes emitted.
It warned “this makes it very unlikely the industry will reach its 2050 net-zero goal”. It suggested the EU’s emissions trading scheme, which applies only to flights within Europe, would apply a more realistic offset by requiring passengers pay €48 to offset a US flight from Europe.
The group also dismissed the prospects of ICAO setting an LTAG as “a smokescreen”, noting: “Several countries have already stated an LTAG should not limit the growth of their aviation.”
However, Iata director general Willie Walsh has described the ICAO assembly and agreement on an LTAG as “critical”. Noting Iata member airlines had taken “the monumental decision to commit to achieving net‑zero emissions by 2050”, he said: “It’s critical the industry is supported by governments with policies focused on the same decarbonisation goal.”
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