Carbon Neutral: The New Way to Fly

Whether traveling to visit a friend studying abroad in London this semester or flying home to California just for the weekend, seasoned travelers take many things into consideration when planning their trips.

They check and re-check flight schedules, ticket prices and in-flight accommodations before booking business or pleasure trips. Regular travelers check their frequent flier miles incessantly, ensuring that every mile traveled is logged. But even the most seasoned passengers forget to add one more item to the total price of their travel -- the environmental cost.

Those travelers often associate carbon emissions mainly with automobiles, but because airplanes use thousands of gallons of fuel per flight, the airplanes that criscross the United States daily are big contributors to the amount of carbon dioxide in the air and, consequently, global warming. In hopes of mitigating the effect of air travel-produced carbon emissions on the atmosphere, environmental groups are partnering with air travel companies to reduce the carbon footprints left by weary travelers.

Expedia and TerraPass, Delta Airlines and The Conservation Fund's Go Zero and Continental Airlines and Sustainable Travel International are trying out new green partnerships, encouraging customers to give monetary donations to offset carbon emissions from air travel.

THE DAMAGE DONE

"The amount of carbon produced by air travel is higher than any other form of travel -- for every passenger mile you travel, you produce about 1.25 lbs of carbon dioxide," said Megan Epler-Wood, president and founder of The International Ecotourism Society, an organization that works to unite communities with conservation and sustainable travel.

She said although many people know that such an intense release of fossil fuels into the atmosphere has profound effects on the earth, and even with the near-ubiquitous success of the popular global warming awareness film An Inconvenient Truth, many fail to understand fully America's contribution to the world's environmental problems. Consumers do not know how to decrease their own carbon impact, Epler-Wood said.

"The problem is that America is hooked on big cars, big houses, big highways and frequent travel for business and pleasure," said Epler-Wood.

GREEN: THE NEW BLACK?

Many people have a desire to reduce their carbon footprints, said Jenna Thompson, director of Go Zero, a branch of The Conservation Fund that is working with Delta Airlines -- carbon emissions, she said, come mainly from heating their homes and traveling -- but are unsure how best to do so.

The Go Zero-Delta partnership offers Delta passengers the opportunity to literally pay for their personal pollution.

"While it would be great for people to just ride bikes and use wind power, we have to be realistic," she said. "You can begin to reduce the carbon you are able to, and then offset what you cannot reduce."

Although experimental and currently only a temporary solution, Go Zero removes carbon dioxide from the atmosphere through sequestration -- using donations to replant trees in hopes they will absorb more carbon from the atmosphere, mitigating the effects of global warming.

Go Zero is one of a few carbon neutral companies that promotes sequestration.

Delta Airlines became the first major corporate airline to become carbon-aware, offering customers an optional fee of $5.50 to offset their carbon expenditure on domestic flights and $11.00 for international flights. Delta started offering the options June 1, said spokeswoman Katie Connell.

"Many of our customers and employees worldwide are passionate about global environmental issues, and Delta is committed to providing a platform to enable them to take action," said Delta Chief Operating Officer Jim Whitehurst in a press release June 18.

Jet airplanes burn about 100 gallons of fuel per passenger on a cross-country flight, according to TerraPass, a for-profit environmental company which with Expedia is giving travelers the chance to pay to balance the emissions they cannot reduce.

EXPLORING ALTERNATIVES

Planting trees isn't the only way environmental groups and travel companies are trying to reduce their customers' carbon footprints -- some are donating to alternative-energy endeavors like wind energy and even power derived from cow manure.

TerraPass is one company that uses monetary donations from travelers to fund alternative energy projects, and invests in wind energy, improving industrial efficiency and biomass harvesting.

According to the TerraPass website, one of its pet projects, the Garwin McNeilus Wind Farm in Minnesota generates enough electrical power for customers scattered throughout Minnesota, Nebraska, North Dakota, Manitoba and Saskatchewan.

At the Haubenschild Dairy Farm, also in Minnesota, manure is pumped into a digester where natural microbial action converts manure nutrients into methane, according to the company website.

TerraPass customers can calculate by distance and mode of travel the approximate amount of carbon emissions for which they will be responsible on their next trip -- or over their lifetimes -- and donate accordingly.

The TerraPass Puddle Jumper, at $9.95, balances 2,500 lbs of carbon dioxide, equivalent to a 6,000-mile flight. For the lifelong traveler, the TerraPass Aviator offsets 450,000 lbs of carbon dioxide, or about 1,000,000 miles of air travel -- for $1,749.95. TerraPass accepts donations for carbon expenses from car, plane, and home use.

A GLOBAL INITIATIVE

In a recent Tufts University Climate Initiative study, TerraPass ranks as a company they "recommend with reservation." Tufts Climate Initiative evaluated offsetting companies based on the following criteria: air travel emissions calculator, project portfolios, project location, project/offset quality, and transparency. Terrapass is "recommended with reservation" because its air travel emissions calculator does account for full radiative forcing and underestimates emissions from air travel, according to the TCI website.

"The study was a test of many of the carbon offsetting companies out there, and how it compares to other methods of conservation," TCI Outreach Coordinator Anja Kollmuss said. "I think that a lot of people think it is an easy way to continue to use carbon, but there is no research on consumer behavior and how people think after they offset. So it is either a way for people to change their life and take steps towards conservation, or it is an excuse for their lifestyle. Either way, they are still contributing to bettering the world."

NativeEnergy, a privately held Native American for-profit energy company founded in 2000, is ranked alongside companies climate friendly, myclimate and atmosfair at the top of TCI's list.

NativeEnergy uses carbon offsetting to develop renewable energy projects on Native American lands and farmer-owned wind, solar and methane projects across the country. TCI recommends NativeEnergy because its air travel emissions calculator uses a factor of two to account for full radiative forcing and TCI found its website very thorough, with answers to technical questions.

"NativeEnergy is rather unique in that it works with Native Americans, and a lot of family owned farms," said NativeEnergy Marketing Director Billy Connelly. "We have currently been working with the Rosebud Sioux Tribe Reservation in South Dakota, helping them build a wind-turbine." 

Donations from eco-friendly citizens support the building of renewable energy sources. 

"The wind turbine we are building will offset carbon for the reservation for the next 25 years," Connelly said. "In a couple of years, the energy produced from the project will exceed the need of the reservation, and that means the people on the reservation can sell energy at a profit," he continued.

PLANT A TREE, HUG A TREE

While some environmental companies advocate for reforestation, Billy Connelly said carbon sequestration is not the most productive way to become carbon neutral, although it is a nice idea.

"These trees will die, and when they do they will release the carbon they stored back into the environment -- the only long term solution is to find new energy sources," Connelly said. "Until we can find a way to make permanent sequestration possible, it is just a solution that will unravel itself."

One environmental website, Cheatneutral.com, makes a joke of carbon offsetting. "Carbon offsetting is about paying for the right to carry on emitting carbon," according to the website.

Thompson stands by carbon sequestration, arguing that reforestation is the only process that deals with the status quo.

"Just because [carbon offsetting] isn't perfect, doesn't mean we should ignore the present," she said.

Thompson hopes to see progress in the next 100 years, a tree's typical lifespan.

"Planting trees to secure carbon is the only current way to actually remove the carbon from the air," Thompson said. "While there may be other forms of research toward finding other fuel sources, our company approaches solving the current problem."

NOT WITHOUT RESERVATION

"We found that there is no substitution for trying to personally reduce how much travel you have. Since air travel is growing bigger, it will be harder to neutralize all the impacts. However, carbon offsetting can reduce emissions, and it will help fund projects that can find new sources. It is not a complete answer in and of itself, though," Kollmuss said.

Although global warming is not a new concern, carbon offsetting is a relatively new solution. In 2006, the New Oxford American Dictionary ranked "carbon neutral" the word of the year. But although many travelers might like to become carbon neutral, some cannot afford it.

"I fly back and forth from Turkey at least four times a year, and most of the time I have to pay for most of my ticket," College of Engineering freshman Ege Gurocak said. "Paying [for an offset] each time I go might be difficult; maybe the airlines should add the cost of cleaning the air to the total sum of flight expense, and that way everyone would have to pay it initially."