This is a press release from the Swedish Aviation Society, an industry organisation of which LFV is a member. LFV is the State enterprise that operates Sweden’s major airports.
In its proposal to the Swedish Parliament’s Climate Committee, which presented its report yesterday, the Green Party of Sweden proposed that Swedish domestic aviation south of Sundsvall should be discontinued. Such a step would have little effect on overall Swedish carbon dioxide emissions but would cause major impediments to accessibility in a large, thinly populated country like Sweden.
“The Green Party is wrong if it believes that measures to curtail domestic aviation would have any major effect on achieving the target of an 85 per cent reduction in Sweden’s carbon dioxide emissions by 2050,” says Peeter Puusepp, Secretary General of the Swedish Aviation Society. “According to the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, domestic aviation accounts for one per cent of overall Swedish carbon dioxide emissions. Discontinuing domestic aviation south of Sundsvall is neither a credible nor a realistic measure. Experience also shows that if a mode of public transport disappears, there is a major shift to cars instead of to other modes of public transport.”
According to the Swedish Institute for Transport and Communications Analysis (SIKA), carbon dioxide emissions from domestic aviation in Sweden have decreased somewhat since 1990. Meanwhile carbon dioxide emissions from road traffic have risen by more than eleven per cent − primarily due to a sharp increase in lorry traffic.
The final report of the government-appointed investigation of Sweden’s airports (SOU 2007:70), published in October 2007, estimates that the number of domestic aviation passengers will decline by up to 1.5 per cent annually between now and 2020. Each new generation of aircraft is more fuel-efficient and thus has lower carbon dioxide emissions than the generation it replaces. Every airline also has a natural ambition to continuously reduce its fuel consumption through more efficient aircraft utilisation. In addition, Scandinavian Airlines and LFV are conducting “green flight” experiments, with every such flight resulting in a reduction of carbon dioxide emissions by at least 400 kg. It is thus highly realistic to count on a continued net reduction in carbon dioxide emissions from domestic aviation until 2020.
“It appears that the Green Party has mixed apples and pears in its forecast of how carbon dioxide emissions from air traffic will change until 2050,” Mr Puusepp says. “Unless the Green Party presents the basis for its calculations, I suspect that it has used forecasts of global aviation traffic trends − which are something completely different from forecasts of Swedish aviation trends − along with Swedish forecasts of road traffic trends. The only reasonable approach would have been to use Swedish forecasts for both modes of transport.”
In late November, the Swedish Aviation Association presented its “Ten Points for More Climate-Adapted Aviation” to show what the Swedish aviation industry intends to do to assume its share of responsibility for reducing the proportion of overall Swedish carbon dioxide emissions generated by the transport sector. These ten points, in turn, are based on the conclusions and recommendations of the final report submitted by the Aviation Industry Environmental Committee to the Swedish Aviation Association.
“These ten points are realistic and achievable measures, which will result in real and sustainable reductions in the climate impact of the Swedish aviation industry,” says Mr Puusepp. “We have already begun implementing these proposals.”
In a large and thinly populated country like Sweden, domestic aviation is highly important to accessibility. If all of Sweden is to live, aviation is thus needed. There is an unresolved goal conflict between promotion of living rural areas and climate policy – which the Green Party does not touch on in its proposal to the Climate Committee, however.
“Resolving that goal conflict will require carefully crafted, sustainable political decisions and strategies,” Mr Puusepp says. “I would like the Green Party, in a positive and constructive way, to participate in a broad political discussion that leads to such sustainable decisions and strategies.”
No mode of transport can solve all transport needs by itself; all modes of transport are needed. Nor can any mode of transport, by itself, bear the entire transport sector’s share of responsibility for reducing Sweden’s overall carbon dioxide emissions.
“Aviation, rail travel, other modes of public transport but also cars must be used where they are most suitable, in the most macroeconomically efficient way as possible. This will also give us the most macroeconomically efficient reductions of carbon dioxide emissions for the entire transport sector,” Mr Puusepp says.
For further information, please contact:
Peeter Puusepp, Secretary General, Swedish Aviation Society, mobile 070-233 07 91
The conclusions and recommendarions of the Aviation Industry Environmental Committee can be downloaded (in Swedish only) from: http://www.flygtorget.se/miljorapport
The Swedish Aviation Society’s “Ten Points for More Climate-Adapted Aviation” can be downloaded (in Swedish only) from: http://www.flygtorget.se/tiopunkter
The Swedish Aviation Society communicates ideas, opinions and knowledge about commercial aviation and the aviation industry in Sweden. Its purpose is to strengthen the confidence of selected target groups in commercial aviation and the aviation industry in a way that enables them to operate and develop in Sweden.