"I will promise not to take any flights to Europe this year but I want 25 other people who want to live simply to join me."
— Graham Freer, Website Officer at Progressio (contact)
Deadline to sign up by: 31st March 2007
8 people signed up, 17 more were needed
Country: United Kingdom
More details
Hi there. I'm the website officer at the development charity www.Progressio.org.uk I'm concerned about the impact air travel is making on climate change and threat this poses to undermine all the good work we are doiong in tackling poverty and injustice. I'm therefore promising to not to take any European flights during 2007, a tough challenge when air travel is so mouth wateringly cheap these days. Are you prepared to join me in the challenge?
Air travel has increased five-fold over the past 30 years, and demand is projected increase to between two and thee times current levels by 2030. On present trends by 2040 the European Union’s entire budget for carbon emissions will be taken up by aviation alone. Aviation will potentially contribute 15% of greenhouse gases worldwide each year by 2050 if left unchecked.
The biggest problem is not business travel (which only accounts for a quarter of all trips and is not expected to change significantly) but affluent leisure travelers, who make up 76% of all trips (compared with 68% in 1995). In 2003, 96% of the passengers who used Heathrow were from the better-off socio-economic categories. At Stansted, where low cost carriers account for nearly all the flights, the average annual household income of travelers exceeds £47,000. Lower social groups (D and E) took on 6% of flights in 2003 despite making up 27% of the population.
Trains can however provide a viable alternative to flying. Did you know that more than 45% of all flights in Europe are less than 500km in length roughly the distance from London to the Scottish border? The evidence from Europe shows that most people actually prefer to take the train if the city-centre to city centre journey is not much more than three hours.
The benefits of switching to the train would be substantial as air travel produces 19 times the greenhouse gas emissions of trains. Catching Euro Star to Paris from London for example would release 40 times less global warming pollutants into the atmosphere. By joining this promise you can make a huge contribution to safeguarding our future environment.
Statistics courtesy of http://www.airportwatch.org.uk
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Graham Freer, the Promise Creator, joined by: