International Airlines Share News (IAG)

(Sharecast News) - Airlines are lobbying to amend the recently agreed carbon scheme designed to bring down the aviation sector's emissions as the Covid-19 coronavirus crisis makes it harder for carriers to meet their agreed targets.
The International Air Transport Association called on the International Civil Aviation Organization to rewrite the deal or risk airlines pulling out.

Under the scheme, carriers are forced to pay to offset any growth in CO2 emissions above the baseline set by average 2019 and 2020 emissions.

As the pandemic has forced most airlines to ground their planes it would mean that the baseline would be much lower than initially expected and would force the companies to pay much more to offset the emissions.

Campaigners protested the proposal to rewrite the agreement and accused airlines of attempting to "dodge their obligations", but the industry said that it was a "matter of survival" as many carriers would find it challenging to stay afloat.

IATA director general, Alexandre de Juniac, said: "We haven't given up our environmental goals ... After the recovery we will continue to reduce emissions and noise footprints - that hasn't changed.

"This crisis is a matter of survival for the industry ... We are asking governments for urgent help. Of course we will comply with our environmental obligations. Before that, we have to survive - or there will be no issue with the environment, the industry will have disappeared."

Before the Covid-19 crisis, estimates showed that airlines were likely to have to spend between ?4bn and ?18bn annually globally on carbon credits by 2035 to satisfy the agreement's rules.

Iata has told ICAO that the baseline "must be adjusted to ensure the sustainable development of international aviation and avoid an inappropriate economic burden on the sector".

The US Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), a long-time mover behind the Corsia scheme, argued that the existing Corsia rules allowed enough flexibility for governments to address the "suppressed activity in 2020, without any need to renegotiate the measure in a drawn-out political discussion".

James Elliott, a Green Alliance policy adviser, said: "Calls to reduce burdens on the [aviation] sector as it recovers are understandable. But the climate emergency also presents an urgent challenge which must be addressed. If the sector cannot find ways to rebuild itself sustainably after the Covid-19 crisis, it will face painful disruption again in the future as its part in the climate emergency has to be addressed.

"If Corsia is amended, it must be done in a way which also strengthens its ambition, with targets to limit and reduce actual emissions levels."