The Lufthansa Group has defended its launch of ‘green fares’ last week which incorporate the cost of carbon offsetting flight emissions after they were dismissed as “greenwashing fares” by an environmental campaign group.
Lufthansa launched the ‘Green Fares’ from February 15 on flights within Europe and to Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia, claiming they provide “a specific fare for more sustainable travel by using Sustainable Aviation Fuels [SAFs] and contributing to high-quality climate-protection projects”.
The fares are available on the group’s airline websites and via its new distribution capability (NDC) platform for economy and business class bookings.
The offsets are achieved 20% by SAF and 80% by contributions to carbon-offset projects. The Green Fares, available on Lufthansa, Austrian Airlines, Brussels Airlines, Swiss, Edelweiss, Eurowings Discover and Air Dolomiti flights, also offer status miles and free rebooking.
However, campaign group Flight Free UK dismissed the fares as “grossly misleading”, labelling them a “green(washing) fare”.
A Lufthansa Group spokesperson insisted: “The Lufthansa Group takes its responsibility for climate protection seriously.”
The group said the Green Fare payments go to “selected climate-protection projects audited to the highest international standards (Gold Standard and Plan Vivo)”, while the SAF used by the group “is produced from biogenic residual materials such as used cooking oils” and complies with the EU’s Renewable Energy Directive II.
The spokesperson argued the fares “meet an increasing demand” and said: “The goal is to make climate-friendly flying more common.”
An ‘economy green’ fare can cost 30% more than the cheapest Lufthansa ‘economy light’ fare and 16% more than an ‘economy classic’ fare which includes a checked bag.
On a sample Heathrow-to-Munich booking on Lufthansa, the green fare was also priced a little higher than an ‘economy flex’ ticket. The green fares included a checked bag and waive a charge for rebooking but are non-refundable unlike a flex ticket.
The spokesperson said: “The Green Fares are priced according to the market. There is no standardised model for switching from a ‘non-green’ to a ‘green’ fare. The prices are set according to demand and supply.”
Lufthansa provided an option showing an ‘economy green’ Heathrow-Munich fare of £159.78, when the cheapest economy fare was £122.78 and ‘economy classic’ fare £137.78.
However, the spokesperson said: “It is not necessarily always positioned like this [as the most expensive option].”
Lufthansa Group executive board member Harry Hohmeister said: “The Green Fares were successfully tested last year for flights from Denmark, Sweden and Norway. This showed demand for more sustainable travel offers is increasing.”
Hohmeister said it was not possible to say how much more expensive the tickets would be, but they would be “noticeably” more than the average economy fare.