LONDON: Carbon dioxide emissions from private jets have soared almost 50% in the past four years, said an analysis of 18.7 million flights by almost 26,000 aircraft.
The research published in the Communications Earth & Environment journal has found emissions from private aviation surged to 46% between 2019 and 2023.
The big increase will be a matter of concern for officials preparing to gather in Azerbaijan for the COP29 climate conference scheduled to be held next week.
The study of more than 25,000 aircraft between 2019 and 2023 said the frequent private flyers caused annual emissions that were hundreds of times more than the average person’s total carbon footprint.
The findings emphasized the sector’s boom after wealthy flyers switched to private aviation to continue long-distance journeys when Covid forced lockdowns around the world.
“They also showed a fundamental disregard of climate change at the top of society”, said Stefan Gössling, the paper’s lead author and a professor in the business and economics school of Sweden’s Linnaeus University.
“Private aircraft are used as taxis in many cases, never mind the climate implication,” he added. “The broader population will not understand why they should reduce emissions if the top is not regulated or leading by example,” he added.
The researchers examined tracker data from 18,655,789 private flights by 25,993 registered jet-type private aircraft between 2019 and 2023.
The report said that the flights produced 15.6mn tonnes of Carbon Dioxide in direct emissions in 2023. Which shows a 46% increase from the 2019.
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During the 2022 football World Cup in Qatar, 1,846 private flights were operated while the World Economic Forum in Switzerland last year saw 660 flights and the COP28 conference in the UAE, had 291 flights.
Many rich persons have continued using private jets since the end of the Covid-19 pandemic for privacy and convenience. According to data from the aviation consultant WingX there were 5.1mn private flights in 2023, 15 per cent more than in 2019.
Victor, an Abu Dhabi-based private jet charter company, said more than 500 customers had paid extra US $ 1,300 to reduce the emissions from their flights by using some cleaner fuels.
Though air travel is not the biggest cause of pollution, accounting for 3% of global emissions, environmental groups have demanded much heavier taxation on the private jet industry.
