If you don't get on a plane in 2019...
Do not travel by plane during 2019. That is the proposal of the Swedish Maja Rosen and Lotta Hammar, to which some 7,800 people have already adhered -almost all of them, their compatriots- through Facebook , while some 3,700 have shown interest and some 1,000 more have been added through its website westayontheground.org .
“Flight-free 2019 is a campaign where people promise to stay grounded for the next year, as long as we get 100,000 swedes in total commit to do the same. In this way, we can make a big change for the climate together. It is also a way of proving ourselves to each other, as well as to our political leaders that many of us are willing to do whatever it takes to save the climate,” Rosen tells us.
She hasn't been on a plane for ten years, precisely, so as not to further damage the planet. Since then, she says she has been "struggling" with what to say to her acquaintances when they tell her about their upcoming plane trips.
“On the one hand, you don't want to be a spoilsport, but at the same time, we are in the midst of a serious climate crisis. I think a lot of people would be willing to give up flying if they knew how serious the situation is and how much flying affects the weather; many are not aware,” she explains. “I also think that those who do know don't think it will make much difference if they give up flying, as everyone is flying more than ever. But if there are many of us who make this decision, there will be a big difference.”
Can you imagine spending ten years without flying...?
According to International Air Transport Association (IATA) , more than four billion people flew over the past year. With all this, aviation was just the 2% of global CO2 emissions. However, according to the study _ The Illusion of Green Flying _, by the European NGO Finance and Trade Watch , if we were to take into account all the greenhouse gas emissions from industry -extraction of fuel, manufacture of machinery, construction of airports, etc-, we would arrive at 5%.
"For every ton of CO2 emitted, three square meters of the Arctic ice cap melt," they warn. So, for example, in a return flight from Vienna to the Canary Islands, Approximately 4.5 square meters of the polar ice cap would melt. Or, put another way: if aviation were a country, it would pollute as much as France.
Another worrying aspect is the unstoppable growth of the industry's pollution levels, since from 1990 to 2010, global CO2 emissions increased by 25%, while those due to aviation increased by 70%, according to data from the report. . At that rate, it seems that the greenhouse gases emitted by airplanes will have multiplied by eight in 2050 , and will represent 20% of global emissions.
It seems that the efforts to not pollute are not enough...
However, it seems that organizations such as the aforementioned IATA have taken action on the matter. So in his website on aviation and climate change , in which he admits thorny issues - such as the fact that NOx and water vapor emissions may have a deleterious multiplier effect at higher altitudes - states that, despite the fact that the number of passengers grows by an average of 5% each year, aviation has managed to increase its emissions by only around 3% per period thanks to investment in new technologies and the acquisition of more sustainable practices.
However, none of this seems to convince those conducting the study, not even Rosen and Hammar. “The climate crisis is acute, and if we don't start cutting emissions in the next two years by at least half, many places in the world will be uninhabitable in 20 years. Therefore, people who love to travel should definitely do everything possible to reduce them, “they explain.
Thus, the promise not to take a plane for the next year should be seen, according to her, as “ a chance to explore places you may not have been before , and try to travel by train ”-better than by car, although, in her opinion, doing it by road would be less polluting than flying if you drove with all the seats occupied-. “For example, many Swedes travel to Thailand on vacation instead of enjoying the beautiful beaches that can be reached by train closer to home,” she says.
Traveling by train is much more respectful of the environment
He adds: “Many of the people I have spoken to who have made the decision not to fly say that they now appreciate much more what they can actually do without harming the climate, and that they have had many Exciting experiences and encounters that would have been missed if they flew ”. But will refraining from flying for just one year, as Rosen and Hammar propose, be enough for the environment? “Research has shown that wearing a short-term commitment it increases the chances of longer-term behavioral change,” they reply.
“I think once you've gone a year without flying, you start to think about it in a different way and realize the climate impact it has. It seems to me that most of the people who have signed they will think twice before flying unnecessarily in the future. In fact, many of those who have signed up have told us that they have started to think about the weather in a different way, and that they also try to live in a more kind way with the environment, so this is a way to wake up people and start taking action to save the climate.”
For now, her campaign, which began in January of this year -although it has really been boosted since August, after the end of both maternity leave- is far from getting the 100,000 subscribers that were proposed at first and that would make the action valid, since they have until the end of this year to achieve it. However, these two mothers do not cease in their efforts to raise awareness: they will soon release a video, they want to take their proposal to other countries -to stop flying in 2020- and they even think that, before the 31st of this month, the firms will register a rise in the form of New Year's resolutions. Will it be one of yours?
A sacrifice now so that our children can fly in the future