WestJet CEO says aviation will need significant government support to decarbonize
Alexis von Hoensbroech says the global push to decarbonize the aviation sector by 2050 will lead to a major increase in ticket prices unless governments step in to offer support.
Plane tickets should go up in price as a response to climate change. If people can't afford to take as many flights, then that's a good thing, because flying is one of the least efficient modes of transport from a carbon perspective, and it's twice as bad as the raw numbers would suggest because dumping the carbon into the upper atmosphere actually makes it more effective at warming the planet. Even if the industry manages to "decarbonize" its fuel sources, it's still going be monumentally harmful and wasteful of resources that could be better used elsewhere.
If our government actually cares about consumers having transport options that are both affordable and carbon efficient, they should look at providing any passenger rail service in western canada.
High speed rail in the Montreal to Toronto corridor is a no brainer. Using conventional HSR technology (not 600kmh maglev shit) the time to get from Toronto to Montreal could be brought down to 2 hrs. Anything close to that would eliminate the flights on that route completely, with a much smaller carbon footprint.
Fun fact: the most active air-route in North America is Toronto to NYC, which is about a 750km drive if you try to do a direct route, 850km if you follow the current Amtrak route through Albany, which hits all the major upstate cities for you.
Dedicated high speed rail goes about 300-350km/h. It would be reasonable to image that trip taking 2.5 hours, maybe 3.5 or 4 hours if you do the Albany route and milk-run all the stops like Hamilton, Niagara, Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, Utica, and Albany.
The current rolling stock can hit 200kph; so proper tracks alone can bring that voyage to 2h45.
A flight is 1h20 each way (average) but requires you to be at the terminal 1h in advance. We're taking a 20 difference between flying and the train. Of you need to be downtown, that time is easily saved by Kot needing the UP express or (soon) the REM.
Unfortunately operating speeds are not start to stop. That would probably still be around 3h15. The TGV can do ~270, getting us to the two hours.
HSR plus a France style short-haul flight ban would flights everything inside Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal and drastically reduce Quebec and the horseshoe.
We should have been building our rail networks.
Fuck these corporate scavengers.
Quick rail transit to smaller towns outside the big cities would also help with the housing crisis by giving people more options.
should have been building our rail
Harper was the last one to have that question posed, I think, but it's not in his party's mandate to provide things for the bottom 99%.
The continental aviation industry doesn't need to decarbonize, it needs to be replaced by high-speed rail. Asian countries know this and are building accordingly. Travelling to the Caribbean should involve taking a train to Fort Lauderdale and then flying to your destination to minimize the carbon impact. Westjet can do the latter, not the former.
Why fly when you can boat?
For what reason does someone have to travel to the Caribbean from Canada that would justify any carbon impact?
People are still allowed to want nice things. If I can't dance I don't want to be part of your revolution.
To visit our new province when they finally accept the application. Gov.tc.ca .
Capitalism has spoken! Let the airlines fail!
“Yes, let’s continue as we’ve always been doing, instead of change, and make taxpayers suffer!”
Sounds to me like WestJet are begging to be nationalized.
Let the ticket prices run higher. Who cares?
If they do get a subsidy you know they'll turn around and launch an ad campaign about how they are investing in a green revolution. Then they'll raise fares.
Then a while later they'll revert, say it's infeasible, keep the money then pay a dividend.
2 years ago, I'd only expect this of the other carrier.
Since they were bought by private equity I would say they are probably worse than Air Canada - although I haven't flown with AC in ages, so it's hard to compare.
And if they don't get one, they'll use it as an excuse to raise ticket prices with impunity.
No. Just reducing the profits should be sufficient.
Fuck that, WestJet is owned by a private equity firm now. Let their billionaire owner deal with it and quit begging for government handouts. Bootstraps and all that.