Story by Ross Mars, June 2015
Air travel is significant greenhouse gas emitter
Air travel is recognised as one of the highest producers of carbon dioxide, and so contributes significantly to an individual’s greenhouse gas emissions. Most airlines offer customers a chance (and choice) to pay a little more to offset their travel. Unfortunately most people seem to ignore this offer and I also suspect the (small) cost increase in an airfare is really well below the true cost.
APC13 to consider donating fee for carbon offset projects
While it would be great if all permaculture practitioners automatically considered accepting the carbon offset addition to a fare, it may not be possible to do so for a large number of reasons. While all such schemes are registered by the Australian Government and the funds raised are given to legitimate organisations for tree planting and other endeavours, Perth is seriously considering donating part of a participant’s Convergence fee to local organisations to enable worthwhile projects to be funded.
You can go online and find any number of calculators to work out the carbon produced by travel from one city to another and to also give you some estimate of cost. We intend to pursue this and find ways in which we can reduce everyone’s carbon footprint to attend the Convergence in Perth October 2016. Won’t you join us?
