Bruce McCaffrey: Flying toward a greener airline industry

This Bruce McCaffrey blog entry discusses the notion of making the aviation industry environment-friendly.

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The concept of carbon emissions is never far from the airline industry. This is not a surprise as in a typical flight, CO2 is inevitably discharged. But while it is simple for governments to analyze and account for emissions from fixed sources, it is an arduous task to do so with international aviation. With planes, CO2 is released over international waters, even spanning different continents. This difficulty is one of the many hindrances to “greening” the airline industry since various governments treat aviation emissions differently, resulting to conflicting and overlapping national and regional policies.

Villanova University alumnus Bruce McCaffrey worked as an airline executive for three decades.

For the International Air Transport Association (IATA), aviation is a global industry and should be treated as such. According to the organization, the airline industry should be addressed as a global sector, meaning its emissions should be accounted for at an international level.

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Governments should have a unified, simple, and straightforward understanding of how to handle emissions from aircrafts. They should create a body that will develop and implement global measures to address aviation emissions. These measures can include emissions trading and raising carbon funds.

It is also important for governments to agree on where emission revenues would go. In this case, IATA advises that proceeds should be reserved for environmental purposes, from which a portion will be invested for the development of fuel-efficient and sustainable aviation equipment and devices.

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