Green travel ideas from two environmentally conscious travelers

Is it better to travel by car or plane? A new study claims that in the long run, air travel actually results in less warming than car travel.

The study, published in the Environmental Science & Technology Journal,  offers the following data, as far as freight and passenger transport is concerned:-

Freight Transport: Ship transport has by far the lowest climate impact: It exerts 5 to 10 to 30 times less warming per transport work than trucking.

The specific climate impact of air transport is 3 to 42 times higher than trucking, while rail transport of heavy goods has a 4 to 10 times lower specific climate impact than trucking.

Passenger Transport: Rail travel has at least a factor 4 lower specific impact and is cooling on shorter times, while bus and coach travel has 2 to 5 times lower specific impact. Travel with 2 or 3 wheelers has up to a factor 2 lower specific climate impact than car travel.

All of this is nothing surprising, but the kicker is that the study also posits that in the long run, air travel results in a lower temperature change per passenger-mile than car travel. It seems that cars emit more CO2/passenger-mile than planes, so car travel ends up with a bigger long-term impact.

Airplanes, on the other hand, create a bigger short-term impact due to their proximity to the ozone layer and clouds. As far as per passenger-hour traveled is concerned, aviation climate impact is a factor 6 to 47 higher than the impact from car travel.

Climate Impact of Passenger and Freight Transport: ES&T

Photo - respres

Some time in the not so distant future, you may be heading to Hawaii on a giant green wing, without having to buy offsets or get all worked up over global warming.

That - as per NASA, Boeing, General Electric, Northrop Grumman, and MIT - is the future of aviation.

This Newsweek article lists all the latest green aviation models and trends that are now in the spotlight as a result of the BP oilspill’s shocking wake-up call.

There’s a lot of outlandish and weird looking designs, but the consensus (see MIT’s Hybrid Wing Body H-Series, and Boeing’s X-48B) seems to be that the only practical way to reduce fuel consumption is to fly around on airplanes with giant wings and a 1000+ passenger capacity.

The engines would be mounted above the fuselage, instead of below the wings, thus reducing noise. The entire plane would be one giant blended wing, and would reduce fuel consumption by over 40% over conventional aircraft designs.

The 26 hour Solar Impulse flight by André Borschberg, powered solely by batteries and 12,000 wing-mounted solar cells, also spotlighted the possibilities of hybrid green planes with giant wings. In other words - a flying Prius.

Kiwi Inventor Grant Ryan’s ‘YikeBike’ - the world’s smallest and lightest electric folding bicycle - is making waves as a much-improved replacement for the Segway.

In fact, ChristChurch based Ryan claims that the inspiration for the mini-farthing Yikebike concept came when he first came across the Segway concept being marketed. The Yikebike too provides an easy and eco-friendly way to get around in increasingly congested, polluted, stressful cities.

Ryan explains that “What we have done is take a fresh approach to cycle design to give people freedom to commute easily and quickly in crowded urban environments with a minimal carbon footprint.”

It helps that it’s very easy to carry - weighs less than 10 kg and folds up in less than 15 seconds. And it also looks neat - made from carbon fiber with a sleek finish.

The Yikebike’s handlebars are behind the rider, and it differs vastly from the conventional bicycle model. The chain, gears, pedals, brake pads, cables and levers are replaced with a light 1.2 kW electric motor and smart electronics.

And it’s as safe as can be - with a top speed of 20 km/h and mechanics all totally enclosed so clothes can not get caught or dirty.

It’s also completely green - zero emission, and the best part is that unlike the standard bike, in this case - you don’t have to make a choice between using a vehicle/public transport and a bicycle.

You can start off with the Yikebike, and anytime you feel the need to switch to public transport, just fold it up and get on the bus or train. As simple as that.

Goes without saying that this is an environmentally conscious commuter’s dream - you start off from home on the Yikebike, and fold it up when you reach the train or bus station.

YikeBike is backed by the two largest venture investment firms in New Zealand, Pioneer Capital Partners and K1W1 as well as the Foundation for Research Science and Technology. 

More information about Yikebike here - www.yikebike.com/ and the Mini-Farthing design here - www.minifarthing.com/. Photos courtesy Yikebike Ltd.

So, this month’s Travel & Leisure discusses the issue of whether it creates more greenhouse gases to drive, fly, or take a train. Their conclusion: train is by far the most eco-friendly solution and driving actually produces more emissions to travel the same distance than flying.

T&L’s data came from TerraPass, and without disputing their math (which isn’t laid out), I would say that there are a couple of factors left out of their analysis. For one, they ignore the NUMBER of people who will be driving versus flying. What I mean is that if you have a family of four, it is actually more efficient to drive to your destination than to fly. The reason is that the airplane emissions are on a per-person basis and calculated on plane capacity average plane fuel efficiency, etc.–whereas car emissions are for the vehicle and will not change much if you’re driving alone or if your traveling as a family.

Another factor that T&L conveniently ignores is the factor of fuel efficiency for different vehicles - from SUVs to sedans to hybrids. This obviously has an important effect on the desirability of flying versus driving.

We like to take a more nuanced approach, and so we’ve analyzed figures from the Department of the Environment in Britain which does a has done a more detailed job of comparing different modes of transportation, so we will use their figures and extrapolate from them.

The following are average figures for the amount of pounds of CO₂ per mile released into the atmosphere for each type of transportation:

Total Emissions Per Vehicle
SUV (15mpg) – 2.29 lbs/mi
Average Car (25 mpg) – 1.39 lbs/mi
Prius (55 mpg) - .61 lbs/mi
Motorcycle - .57 lbs/mi
RV – 4.58 lbs/mi

Total Emissions Per Person
Average Car/Single Driver – 1.39 lbs/mi
Average Car/Family of 4 - .34 lbs/mi
Train - .32 lbs/mi
Bus - .48 lbs/mi
Plane (250 mi trip) - .85 lbs/mi**
Plane (600 mi) - .69 lbs/mi**
Plane (3500 mi) - .56 lbs/mi**

Bottom Line:
If you have a choice of how to travel, buses and trains have the fewest carbon emissions. Planes and cars are less favorable options, and which one is more efficient depends on how many people you are traveling with and what car you would drive. A family of four would be better off driving than flying, whereas an individual might actually save emissions by flying.

**One other note: these emissions figures, which are taken from the UK’s DEFRA, do not take into account that emissions from planes have been shown to have a greater warming effect than emissions from land-based transportation. This further cements air travel as the most-polluting form of transport and means that ground transportation is nearly always preferable to flying.

At some point, we’ll address the carbon economics (and benefits) of driving versus flying. But for now, let’s assume you’ve chosen to fly—either because it’s convenient or because it’s the only way to get where you’re going. That shouldn’t be the end of your decision-making process. If you want to reduce your flights’ environmental impact, consider the following tips when booking:

Minimize connections: Most of the fuel used up during a flight is burned during takeoff and landing, so it stands to reason that the more connections you make, the more emissions will be produced on your behalf. Try to book a non-stop flight if possible, which will save you the hassle of layovers, as well.

Fly during the day: Studies have shown that the greenhouse effects of airplane emissions are twice as bad at night than during the day. Again, in this case, environmental concerns may overlap with convenience, since many people prefer to fly during the day anyway.

Offset your emissions: When you do fly, research carbon offset schemes and consider offsetting your plane’s emissions. It’s not a silver bullet, since the atmosphere would be better off if you didn’t fly at all, but it’s better than doing nothing.

Choose airlines based on their performance and environmental commitments: Use your purchasing power to show the airlines that their environmental policies matter to you. For example, Southwest Airlines is one of the few airlines that offers incentives for its flight attendants and cleaning crews to recycle cans and bottles. Continental Airlines was commended by Fortune magazine in 2007 for their energy-efficiency initiatives. In Britain, there is even more competition between airlines to be considered the “greenest.” Virgin Atlantic’s Chairman, Richard Branson, is famous for drumming up celebrity attention for climate change, and Virgin recently announced an upgrade in their fleet and a research program on biofuels for aviation. Easyjet, Ryanair, and British Airways have also been promoting their environmental initiatives

Fly in newer, larger, and more fuel-efficient planes: It’s almost an ironclad rule that newer planes are more fuel efficient. The new Boeing 787 Dreamliner promises to be an industry leader when it hits the market, but in the current fleet, the 777, 747-400, and A330 are the most fuel-efficient planes. Call and ask the airline what planes they have flying the route that you are booking.

Ask lots of questions – generate “consumer pressure”: The environmental issue that airlines are most concerned about is their profits. That is to say that if airlines start to worry about losing customers over their environmental inaction, they will act. As a consumer, you can make a real difference by asking questions of everyone at the airline to generate pressure that will resonate up to the boardroom. Ask whether they recycle, what their environmental policy is, and how fuel-efficient their planes are. And if you don’t get satisfactory answers, switch airlines.

For more tips: See Time Magazine and The Observer.