As delegates gathered for this year’s IATA AGM, TAP Portugal became the first carrier to go live with IATA’s new carbon offset programme. The initiative is aimed at developing an industry-wide scheme that carriers can join to enable passengers to buy carbon offsets for their travel. TAP timed the launch of its carbon offsets to coincide with the United Nation’s World Environment Day on 5 June. "The decision to join the IATA carbon offset program was taken last year, during my term as chairman of IATA’s Board of Governors (June 2007 – June 2008)," says Fernando Pinto, TAP Portugal chief executive.
"We have elected environment as a top priority for IATA’s agenda. I have realized that this program was a good opportunity for TAP to offer our customers a practical tool to compensate, on a voluntary basis, for their carbon emissions, joining TAP’s effort to become more and more efficient in order to minimize the company’s contribution to climate change," says the TAP boss.
IATA began developing the scheme in late 2007 following a request from the board. Although around 30 airlines have launched their own offset programmes, many did not want to create their own, and there is a lack of consistency. "They vary in quality, vary in how emissions are calcualted, and vary on how airlines present them and how passengers can buy them," says Jon Godson, assistant director environment best practice at IATA.
It is critical to have a sound offset programme for customers and one that carriers globally can sign up to. "For the passenger it is a very difficult purchase. They have to believe in the project wholeheartedly – it is essentially a charitable donation," he adds.
According to Maria João Calha, TAP’s environment manager: "To develop and implement the carbon offset program we have created a working group gathering a multi-disciplinary team of experts from several areas of activity within TAP.
"For the last eight months, experts from corporate environmental affairs, information technology, international affairs, marketing, sales, flight operations, financial accounting and communication and public relations, have analyzed and discussed all the technical and commercial questions related to the implementation of this project in TAP. IATA co-operation was extremely important during the entire process."
Hydro-electric offset
As part of the programme, IATA will select credible environmental projects for which it can buy carbon credits paid for from offset schemes. "For the TAP offset it has chosen a hydro-electric project in Brazil," says Godson. IATA will only select projects from which it can buy United Nations so-called Certified Emission Reductions credits. These projects are already up and running and delivering environmental benefits, he says.
Importantly, the IATA scheme uses a carbon calculator tool approved by the UK government, which is independently validated. This uses actual fuel burn data and load factors. IATA manages the offset project and it is easily integrated into the online booking process.
"Together with several industry leaders, I have signed last year an historical commitment to tackle climate change, the Aviation Commitment to Action on Climate Change," said TAP’s Pinto. " Now, I am very proud to announce TAP as the launch airline for this industry-wide scheme, which proves that we are firmly committed to a carbon neutral growth and do believe that a collective effort is the best way to achieve it."
Here at the AGM IATA is encouraging airlines to sign up to the scheme and wants 14, plus one GDS, by year-end. It has memorandum of understandings with five carriers so far, including TAP and Qatar Airways.
Source: Airline Business
