Fuelling the Fire

Every cloud has its silver lining. Environmentalists have good reason to breathe a sigh of relief as the price of oil continues to soar, boosting the renewable energy industry, cutting consumption at the pumps and finally putting the breaks on 6 decades of downward spiralling air fares. As unappealing as this hard truth may be – economic ‘problems’ can do more for the environment than all the dire scientific predictions, green lobbying and climate action protests put together. But to believe the market will eventually bail out the planet is to walk blindfolded into the fire praying for rain to put out the flames.

There was a time – although we didn’t know it then – when the price of flying reflected the environmental cost. Back in the 1950’s a transatlantic flight cost the equivalent of £3000, more than 10 times today’s average. Since then, the air fare avalanche has created a culture of expectancy in the Developed World that is not easy to break out of. ‘Flying’ has become almost synonymous with ‘Travelling’ and travelling – for business or pleasure – an endemic feature of our lifestyle. To give it up, or to accept a journey of 10 days rather than 10 hours, feels like a giant leap backwards, akin to swapping laptops for typewriters, or ipods for gramophones.

It is this expectancy that puts the idea of rationing the amount we fly firmly off the table. Rationing was accepted in Britain and America during the Second World War as an effective means of curbing demand for goods that were in short supply. We are now faced with the prospect that our demand for fossil fuels is directly impacting the world’s climate with devastating consequences yet few, if any, dare to utter the ‘R’ word. Politicians – even environmentalists – are intent on persuading us to change our lifestlyles voluntarily, rather than introduce enforcement (a sure fire vote loser in any context). The problem with this approach is twofold:

1. It can take more than a generation to fundamentally change people’s habits through persuasion. Recycling is only now beginning to catch on in the UK and greens have been waging that campaign for decades. In the context of climate change, time is definitely a luxury we no longer have.

2. Even if society does voluntarily change its habits in a meaningful way, there will always be some who change more than others, making it less fair, and less effective than imposed restrictions.

Until very recently, the answer to climate change lay in offsets and biofuels. They promised a win-win scenario in which we could neutralise the harmful effects of our consumption, without checking our hunger for more. But now that the stampede to replace crop fields with biofuel plantations has sparked the worst global food crisis in decades, and the folly of offsets has been exposed by reports that many of them are never actually implemented, it’s clear that cutbacks rather than shortcuts pose the only viable solution.

Still, the mere sound of the word ‘rationing’ conjures up an aura of gloom. It’s something our grandparents had to put up with. It sounds like a fight for survival that’s simply not in keeping with the progress of the post war decades. ‘Rationing’ spells ‘Failure’.

There are 2 things to say here. The first is that the spectre of catastrophic climate change is not a whole lot more pleasant than world domination by the Nazis. But unlike during the Second World War, it doesn’t feel like we’re faced with such a harrowing prospect – particularly when jetting off to a far away island in the sun. Check out any mainstream holiday ad and what they’re selling is essentially blissful escapism: leave your troubles behind and fly away without a care in the world. Fortunately you’ll be flying high enough not to notice the real troubles below, such as food riots or towns wiped out by cyclones.

The second and more crucial point is that rationing need not spell the end of civilisation as we know it. Even in the Developed World, the majority of people don’t take more than one leisure return flight per year. Yet a blanket ban on anything more could mark a dramatic turnaround in the war against climate change – far more profound than charging 15p for a shopping bag.

What would happen to the economy if such rationing was enforced? It’s an unavoidable reality that cutting consumption will result in the cutting of jobs.
Such is the rationale that underpins support for a new 3rd runway at London’s Heathrow airport. According to the UK government, it’s the only way Heathrow can maintain its competitive advantage and jobs can be saved.

The immediate hole in this argument is that fossil fuels are a finite resource and so by definition, an industry that continues to depend on them must accept inevitable decline. Any measures aimed at preserving a ‘competitive edge’ are necessarily temporary. When the end of oil will actually come is anybody’s guess – even our knowledge of current reserves is fairly vague due to the closed doors of OPEC. But the most optimistic experts predict that we are fast approaching Peak Oil – the point at which the rate of production enters terminal decline.

New technologies such as hydrogen powered aircraft are hardly any closer to fruition than the end of oil itself and the carbon savings from biofuels are negligible. According to the World Development Movement even if all flights used biofuels, the reduction in aviation's contribution to climate change would be cancelled out by one year's expected growth in the number of flights. Not to mention the widespread food poverty and deforestation they have already caused.

For some this all leads to a resigned acceptance of the status quo – if we carry on as we are, peak oil will eventually invoke a perpetual spiral in the oil price, and market forces will finally force us to give it up. But if we remain dependent on oil until it starts to run out, we risk not just higher prices but widespread economic depression, instability and unrest. Even that’s a moot point if climate chaos wreaks global havoc first. Saving jobs is important, but not at the cost of our lives.

All roads lead to the necessity of mitigating demand and flight rationing is a natural starting point. Aviation is by far the fastest growing source of climate changing emissions and jet fuel already accounts for 7-10% of global oil usage. Given projected growth in demand for flights and the post-peak oil decline, this proportion looks set to increase exponentially.

On a country by country basis, flight rationing simply wouldn’t work. For one thing, the net demand/supply effect of one or a few country’s rations could bring air fares down globally enabling others to fly more and rendering it a lose-lose scenario. International consensus is the only way forward and the Inter Governmental Panel on Climate Change – the scientific body that has predicted irreversible climate chaos if average temperatures warm by more than 2 degrees – should set mandatory limits on flying for all countries on a per capita basis, enforced by the United Nations.

If this sounds hopelessly implausible consider this: Flying is a relatively easy thing to ration – it is already heavily regulated for security and immigration reasons and due to the high barriers to entry there is virtually no black market. If it still sounds fanciful that’s just because we are so used to Economics winning the battle it’s hard to imagine another way. In the words of the Situationists, now more than ever is the time to be realistic and demand the impossible.

There’s another upside to Rationing. Put simply, it’s fair. Rather than allowing market forces to ensure that the wealthiest continue to consume and fly with reckless abandon, rationing would ensure that we all share the burden of caring for the planet. Best of all, high profile celebrities will no longer be able to preach on the imperatives of green living before hopping aboard their private jets.

Finally, whilst flight rationing will certainly hurt the airlines, it will provide a much needed boost to the rail industry. The development of high speed rail links around the world will do much to sweeten the pill of less flying for avid travellers. Ironically, long distance rail goers are the true travelling pioneers of today, chartering a new frontier in enriched holiday experiences that don’t wreck the planet. In the war against climate change, the only way forward is to take a step back.