Earth science fundamentals and applications

Earth Science - Aviation & Pollution

SCIENCE ARTICLE SUMMARY: AVIATION and POLLUTION

By the turn of the twenty-first century, scientists understood that the reliance on hydrocarbons and fossil fuel in modern society comes with a very high price. Within one hundred years of the Industrial revolution, air pollution had become a serious health hazard. Modern technology and the tremendous numbers of gasoline-powered vehicles on the planet today are contributing to the problem of global warming.

According to recent studies, scientists now report that one of the most concentrated contributors to pollution, greenhouse gas formation, and global warming is the aviation industry. As much pollution as modern factories and gas-powered vehicles contribute to the global climate, aviation fuel actually introduces as much as five times the total amount of pollution generated on the ground.

In recognition of the problem of manmade pollution, the European Union imposed sanctions on the power industry in the last decade of the previous century.

However, because it only punished unsatisfactory compliance with financial penalties, the energy companies at issue were able to simply pass along the additional costs to consumers. Instead of ensuring the reduction of emissions from the power industry to address the global warming problem, this actually resulted in a financial profit for that industry.

At the recent European Union Environmental Council in Brussels, the European

Emissions Trading Scheme proposed the reduction of harmful emissions from another industry, commercial aviation, intended to reduce its emissions into the atmosphere by 20 to 30% by a target date of 2020. However, the actual limits proposed by the Council are much higher (90%) than levels from 1990, before any controls were in place. In reality, emissions from the aviation sector covered by the European Union's authority are actually still increasing by as much as 4% per year. Furthermore, whereas the European Parliament originally intended for the aviation sector to comply with the new restrictions on emissions by 2011, the recent EU Environmental Council in Brussels proposed postponing that another year to 2012.

More importantly, there are financial mechanisms capable of limiting the ability of regulated industries to purchase exemptions that function very much the same way traffic fines do. Instead of limiting the opportunity to do so within the aviation industry, the recent Council proposal set a very relaxed standard that will enable the aviation industry to simply pay for the right to continue to pollute at rates that are not significantly reduced as intended. At the same time, the European Council has proposed a reduction of 8% from the 1990 emission levels by the year 2012. In view of the loopholes that currently would allow the industry to simply pay its way out of full compliance, that hope is not particularly realistic.