Net zero doesn't mean that aviation needs to be zero
There’s an horrendous logical mistake being made over climate change and emissions. Ah, yes, we might say several but just stick with this one for the moment. Take this net zero idea as a goal - no, just assume that to begin with and let us then explore.
We then get told that individual sectors, or actors, or activities, must then become non-emittive. Which isn’t the point of net zero at all, rather, society as a whole should create no net emissions.
This does matter:
Where are we with emissions? The IBA consultancy ran a webinar last week looking at just that question. Since 2018 the average amount of CO2 produced per seat flown has fallen by nearly 6 per cent. But total emissions are due to increase, thanks to commercial aviation’s steady growth. Next year we are forecast to be back roughly where we were before the pandemic struck, with 900 million tonnes of CO2 produced by airline fleets. After running through the various new technologies available, IBA concludes: “There is no readily available technology to radically decarbonise aviation.”
The industry has a goal of reaching net-zero emissions by 2050.
But the industry shouldn’t be trying to reach net zero - it’s the whole society which has that aim. The entire point of the “net” part of the phrase is that there will be emissions, somewhere in some corner of the economy, and that those will be outweighed by negative emissions elsewhere. This does - logically and obviously - mean that we’re fine with there being positive emissions somewhere, in some corner of the economy.
Net zero doesn’t mean that all activities must be non-emittive, it means, by definition, exactly the opposite.
Now we have our suspicion - and it’s no more than that - that the way aviation will work out is cheap solar to electrolysis, green hydrogen through Fischer Tropf to jet fuel. That would be a zero gross emissions process.
But we do still insist upon this basic logic. The very fact that the rallying cry is “net zero” emissions includes, as a logical certainty, that we’re fine with certain activities creating emissions. Simply because if we weren’t then the cry would be “zero” emissions, not “net zero”.
Zero emissions having a certain problem to it, as with humans and other mammals continuing to breathe.