Dublin Airport & CO2 – a NERDs view

TL:DR Passenger limits can’t work at Dublin Airport due to population growth and the general principle that transport hubs work best at scale i.e. the more flights through Dublin the less CO2 we will emit with more direct routings. My view is that we should implement carbon budgets for flying, and make the carbon cost and tax on flying visible to consumers. Its not enough to ‘offset’ your emissions when buying the ticket, show us the actual kg CO2 inclusive of radiative forcing (freely available via ICAO[2] and others for CORSIA[3]). That is we need to put limits in terms of CO2 budgets not passenger numbers.

EU labelling flights for CO2

“The ReFuelEU Aviation Regulation creates a voluntary labelling scheme for flights based on a common, standardised and publicly accessible methodology to calculate flight emissions. The label will allow passengers to make informed choices when comparing flight options.” Have your say at https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/better-regulation/have-your-say/initiatives/14142-Flight-Emissions-Label_en

Sample EU CO2 flight label from consultation papers.

I’ve written before about limiting flights in Ireland (https://aems.ie/blog/flygskam-or-suvskam/) but the ongoing controversy wrt Dublin Airport passenger cap prompts me to promote the EU Flight Label proposal (voluntary) and add my tuppence worth to this debate.

As usual here in Ireland we are being sucked down a distraction hole; namely passenger numbers. Reducing CO2 is the aim not stopping an island nation flying.

Growth

As a successful and currently rich island nation, we are a people of migration – inward and outward.

Our population was projected to climb from 4.7m in 2018 to 5.2m by 2030 – we hit 5.2m in 2023, making the CSO high projection of 6.7m[6] by 2050 look distinctly likely by which time we must be at net zero emissions. That’s a 43% increase in population from 2018 (Climate Act baseline year) to 2050 with a 90+% decrease in GHG emissions across all of society (can we do it? Yes we can, See the internet scepticism of c.2000 and recent RMI views on our progress).

In my own work I’ve been using online platforms since the 1990s, so I’m very much a digital first worker, but people buy from people. face to face meetings are still necessary. More increasingly dispersed families will travel more for births, marriages and deaths, aviation use is not just for holidays. In this context, limiting passenger numbers is likely a fools errand (politically).

Carbon Taxes

Ryanair, Aer Lingus and all flights within Europe already buy their carbon credits via the EU ETS which at time of writing was pricing c.€66/tonne CO2[4], although the price has been as high as the €100/tonne embodied in our carbon tax to 2030 (agreed to by all major parties in Dail Eireann in 2019 – currently we pay €63.50/tonne CO2 on diesel, petrol, gas etc.).

Why not make this CO2 € value & kg CO2 transparent on the airline booking systems now? Whilst the planning process winds its painfully slow way through appeals and NIMBYs over the next few years. This would be an immediate #ClimateAction by the aviation industry.

Airlines operating in Ireland can introduce the proposed Eu Labelling as a ticketing change to show kg CO2 in weeks if not months, on the clear understanding we the people of Ireland aka the Government will use it to increase an aviation carbon tax over time. Doing so would back up airline claims of trying to be more sustainable. Note I said airlines, Dublin Airport does not operate any planes.

Fly like a NERD

What can you and I do right now to reduce our (hopefully necessary) international travel emissions? Take the boat. But even as a transport nerd, I still haven’t found a business journey where that’s practicable – it is absolutely possible as many Green Party reps and public servants have demonstrated.

Instead try Flying like a NERD[7] is reputed to reduce CO2 by up to 20%. How does it work?

Fly NEW i.e. on the newest most efficient plane you can choose.
Fly ECONOMY i.e. maximum load factor to reduce the CO2/PAX.Km
Fly REGULAR i.e. scheduled airlines not private jets or low load factor routes.
Fly DIRECT this may mean staying longer away or taking the train (as Lufthansa[8] offers)

If this sounds like Ryanair you have a point, they fly the most modern fleet in Europe. It also means growing Dublin Airport as a hub airport. The more flights connect via Dublin the more Ireland’s growing population can fly direct – hopefully to a rail connected airport in Europe.

A sense of urgency is needed from Government and Fingal CoCo to put heavy rail into Dublin Airport and connect the Northwest, Belfast and Southeast to Dublin airport (where over 1,000[9] buses already arrive and depart daily). No Metro won’t do, its essentially a much-needed line for Swords (similar to the tube line to Heathrow, when did you last use that?).

We can’t and shouldn’t put all our eggs in any one port or basket, so how do we counterbalance Dublin in regional development? Limerick/Shannon with its long runways, deep water, motorway and rail connections, located between Cork and Galway has a strong claim to provide that counterweight. The rapidly melting artic ice also unfortunately opens the Shannon Estuary up as a way point on North South trade routes which may come to exist in the future. A clear long-term plan by Government backed by local authorities is needed to focus our limited resources and climate actions on these two airports. We can’t argue with geography in Climate action.

That is not to say that other airports and ports are not viable – Waterford for instance is our closest sea port to mainland Europe by sea and is also rail and motorway connected – we will need all our sea and air ports to supply our rapidly growing population’s needs.

Alternatives to Jet A1

We don’t yet have an alternative to fossil fuel powered airliners and we do live on island where 90-95% of passenger traffic is by air (CSO).

No amount of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF[10]) is going to get the aviation industry to net zero by 2050 as it is burnt in existing jet engines which generate contrails (and radiative forcing). Alternative power plants and new planes are needed as soon as possible, the 25 years left to 2050 is a brief time in vehicle development whether that’s aircraft, buses or trains.

We can see alternatives in the form of hydrogen[11] and battery electric[12] airliners on the horizon, a recent study[13] in the Netherlands showed that a battery electric airliner using current battery technology would have the same fuel weight as an original Boeing 707 i.e. within the realms of the technically doable (commercial viability would be improved with carbon taxes) .

If we are to fund investment in zero emissions renewable energy to charge or fuel new planes, we need capital and lots of it i.e. a successful economy is key to securing investment whether that’s in sustainable farming or green hydrogen (a key ingredient in SAF by the way).

As it happens Ireland is also one of the world’s leading lessors[14] for new airliners, so we are in a strong position to accelerate alternative powerplant development for short over water routes like the Irish sea and to rail hubs like Schiphol).

Showing the carbon emitted on every flight ticket lays the foundations for airlines to show reduced emissions with slower planes (propeller vs jet) now or alternative fuels and power plants in the future. It opens immediate choices to consumers.

Hard choices

Whatever way we tackle the absolute need to reduce our GHG emissions by 50% to 2030 and net zero by 2050, we face hard choices; if we are to subsidise landowners and build out renewables, we need a successful growing economy with faster decision making across all of government i.e. local, regulatory and justice.

I showed some years back that if the alternative to flying Dublin-Donegal[15] is driving alone by car its worse for CO2. I’m still not saying flying is greener, but we need to be careful what we wish for. Whilst we debate limits on passenger numbers at Dublin Airport, remember SUV’s are responsible for more CO2 growth than the growth in CO2 from flying to date [IEA[16]] – where’s the political energy and will to follow Paris with pricing motor tax by unladen (empty) vehicle weight? As the Norwegians have been doing for decades (and as we do for commercial vehicles).

Economic growth means business travel and in today’s world skills migration; with a CSO projected population of 6.7m by 2050, if anything DAA should be applying for a 50m cap on passenger numbers not 40m and government should be backing airlines with the means to reduce CO2 by incentivising alternative fuels and zero emissions powerplants, as the IDA[17] does for industry, and the EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP[18]) does for farming.

The aviation industry is a king of centralised IT, it should be able to put CO2 on tickets far faster than any trucker, yet truckers are doing this now, and in France truckers have been doing it on invoices by law since 2012 (https://www.objectifco2.fr/ ).

So, instead of dancing on the head of a planning pin, lets publicise the carbon tax on flying (ETS), and show CO2 transparently on every ticket at every point of sale now. In time this data can show alternatives such as rail-ferry (Lufthansa already includes rail fares in its flights), alternative power plants and fuels allowing us all as businesspeople, families and holiday makers to make informed choices.

This will help to reduce demand for flights out of Dublin Airport but fundamentally it moves the island on a step in its climate action.

When confronting my own choices, I wish I lived on the European mainland and could take the train everywhere, but I don’t. I can use my vote and voice to try to accelerate climate action.

Whether you are farmer, or a passenger please lobby your politicians and public reps to bring the existing carbon costs in aviation to the surface of our air fares and encourage them to increase it annually in line with the science as we do with our carbon taxes on our imported fossil fuels.

Farmers enjoy a relief[19] for carbon tax on diesel, which is surprising, but they are in my experience efficient and miserly users of diesel (blocking the M50 excepted). Perhaps as part of this discussion we should all agree to pay our fair share of carbon taxes in our business and private lives?

[1] 7^th Feb 24 https://www.businesspost.ie/analysis/lift-the-dublin-airport-passenger-cap-leo-varadkars-ministers-can-tell-it-to-the-farmers/

[2] https://www.icao.int/environmental-protection/CarbonOffset/Pages/default.aspx

[3] https://www.icao.int/environmental-protection/CORSIA/pages/default.aspx

[4] 9^th Feb 24 https://ember-climate.org/data/data-tools/carbon-price-viewer/

[5] January 2020 https://www.farmersjournal.ie/news/news/watch-tractor-protest-heads-for-the-m50-521056

[6] CSO.ie Population projections 2016-2051 https://www.cso.ie/en/releasesandpublications/ep/p-plfp/populationandlabourforceprojections2017-2051/populationprojectionsresults/

[7] Fly like a NERD by the ICCT https://theicct.org/need-to-fly-fly-like-a-nerd/

[8] Rail & Fly to and from Lufthansa flights https://www.lufthansa.com/gb/en/rail-and-fly

[9] https://dublingazette.com/dublinlocalmatters/news/dublin-airports-pledge-55543/

[10] RTE Article about making SAF here in Ireland https://www.rte.ie/news/business/2023/0313/1361501-ireland-well-positioned-to-develop-saf/

[11] Airbus on hydrogen electric https://www.airbus.com/en/innovation/low-carbon-aviation/hydrogen/zeroe

[12] ALICE a small regional airliner https://www.popularmechanics.com/flight/a41453056/eviation-electric-aircraft/