Many countries have set specific climate goals, and achieving those goals requires taking concrete steps to reduce emissions. Along those lines, France’s Minister of Transport has made a proposal that’s raising some eyebrows…
In this post:
France proposes minimum airline ticket prices
France’s Minister of Transport, Clément Beaune, has outlined plans to essentially eliminate ultra-cheap airline tickets within France. Beaune has proposed “the establishment of a minimum air ticket price” in order to “fight against social and environmental dumping.”
He plans to submit this proposal in the days to come. As he describes it, “plane tickets at €10, at a time of ecological transition, this is no longer possible,” and that “this does not reflect the price for the planet.”
This would initially only apply to domestic flights, given that this would be much more complicated to implement on international flights, given varying international laws. Keep in mind that France already recently banned many short haul domestic flights, which can be covered by train in up to 2hr30min.
It’s not entirely clear yet in what form this legislation would come. Would the country simply set a minimum ticket price, and airlines can pocket higher margins? Would the higher ticket cost come in the form of a ticket tax? If so, what would that tax revenue be used for?
My take on this proposed legislation in France
I can appreciate the challenge that governments face with trying to achieve their goals of reducing carbon emissions. However, it seems like a lot of governments are going about this wrong, and aren’t focusing on the big picture.
To start, let’s just briefly discuss the arguments that airline executives tend to make. For example, the CEO of ultra low cost carrier Wizz Air argues that business class should be banned, because it’s bad for the environment. Meanwhile the CEO of Lufthansa argues that it’s irresponsible to sell €10 flights in terms of the environmental impact. How convenient that they have these perspectives!
If you ask me, governments wanting to reduce emissions from air travel should:
- Ban or heavily restrict private jets, since the emissions there are disproportionately large
- Incentivize airlines to operate modern jets with good fuel efficiency, and to operate flights that are full, so that the per-passenger emissions are as low as possible
- If there are going to be additional taxes on flying, they should directly and transparently be invested in efficient climate offset schemes, rather than just being used to pad the government’s bottom line
So along those lines, I find France’s proposal to be kind of silly. The country would essentially penalize those passengers flying most efficiently, while giving a lot of pricing power to airlines like Air France. Also, the impact of this would be truly negligible, as it would only apply to domestic flights within France. There already aren’t many of those, given the previous ban that France has put into place, which doesn’t even seem to be accomplishing what was intended (given the need for even further government restrictions).
Bottom line
France’s Minister of Transport is proposing a new minimum ticket price for domestic flights, as he argues that €10 fares are “no longer possible,” and “this does not reflect the price for the planet.” While I can appreciate the need to reduce emissions in line with France’s stated goals, this doesn’t seem like a well thought out way to go about it, in my opinion.
What do you make of France’s minimum ticket price proposal?
This guy to the peasants, Qu'ils mangent de la brioche
Just a way to allow the wealthy to do as they please while keeping middle a lower class citizens from enjoying the benefit of air travel. Another step toward socialism in the ongoing war of the wealthy against those less fortunate.
The exact opposite of what socialism means
Most people believe certain politicians and their policies do things that will benefit them but in reality these policies actually benefit the CEOs and the wealthy investors. Additionally, these people believe these politicians represent god.
The captioned case is a poorly contrived profit scheme that I actually hope kicks those unenlightened Frenchman's butt.
Putting a floor on ticket prices to ban cheap flights in order to save the planet is a noble proposition however on its face its just another profit enrichment scheme. Its the management and wealthy investors are who is going to benefit from banning cheap airline tickets. All the talk about saving the planet by wringing out more profit would probably appeal to people in the nuthouse.
The problem is not that airfare is too cheap, but rather that state owned railways are inefficient and even with generous subsidies have to pass on their bloated costs. If monsieur le ministre were serious about getting people onto lower carbon transport, he would privatize passenger rail to put it on a level playing field with the airlines. But that would mean downsizing his ministry and thus his prestige. There's no way any public official...
The problem is not that airfare is too cheap, but rather that state owned railways are inefficient and even with generous subsidies have to pass on their bloated costs. If monsieur le ministre were serious about getting people onto lower carbon transport, he would privatize passenger rail to put it on a level playing field with the airlines. But that would mean downsizing his ministry and thus his prestige. There's no way any public official in any country of any party would do that. Thus, crazy ideas like this.
Privatizing a service actually benefits just a very few instead of a democratically owned public..I wonder why this guy gets off thinking he is going to benefit in someone else's profit scheme. He's probably on welfare and cant afford to fly anyway so he repeats the managements line.
The solution to the issue is to be rational, holistic and coordinated, and "quick and easy" legislation may be politically a short term utility, but won't prevent our planet declining in health. The main causes of urban pollution is due to discretionary use of road vehicles. So, the first source of pollution, the personal car or truck can only be curtailed by:
a. Redesigning communities to be LESS dependent upon personal vehicles. New York and...
The solution to the issue is to be rational, holistic and coordinated, and "quick and easy" legislation may be politically a short term utility, but won't prevent our planet declining in health. The main causes of urban pollution is due to discretionary use of road vehicles. So, the first source of pollution, the personal car or truck can only be curtailed by:
a. Redesigning communities to be LESS dependent upon personal vehicles. New York and San Francisco are the only urban communities in the US where most people can live, work and play without a car. They are dense, there are neighborhood stores in walking distance, and they have affordable, efficient public and private transport; they are also among the most expensive placed to find accommodation in the US. We can't suddenly make LA less of a county than a city, but we can encourage residential/commercial designs and telecommuting. It is insane that the US is the only place where people may have to get into a car to do the most simple of everday shopping.
b. Imposing a fee on fuel that will be exclusively diverted to pollution reduction initiatives, to make the true cost of polluting fuels become immediately manifest. This is tantamount to charging fees on cigarettes in such a way that it would pay for future illness, loss of productivity cigarettes may cause. It would also lead to reduced health insurance costs if such predictable risks of smoking is born by the producer and consumers of such products. Pretty soon, we will see private industry and behaviors adapt if they immediately have to bear the brunt of actual costs of using fuels.
c. Before launching headlong into "all electric", one should examine the entire effect of any radical change. The most mentioned form of storing electrical energy is the lithium-ion battery. Scale-up is not only inadequate to meet replacement of combustible-based engines, but it takes very high toll on non-carbon deleterious effects on the environment, and may also lead to security issues when there is inadequate domestic supply of the raw materials. Furthermore, lithium ion batteries are NOT recyclable, leading to yet another environmental hazard. NO. Let's invest in non-polluting battery technology. What happended to the "hydrogen fuel cell" platform, whereby cleanly-produced hydrogen is stored in a dense, inert substrate reversibly. Hydrogen can be easily produced worldwide by using solar or wind intermittent power to hybrolyze water, producing oxygen and hydrogen. For example, France's government has mandated that combustible fuel engines would be completely phased out by 2053 about. That's a laudable goal, but it should be accompanied by guaranteed availability of sustainable battery technologies. France doesn't have a particularly polluting situation; cities are compact and densely catered in terms of public transport, and most of France's electricity is from nuclear sources.
d. Disallow excessive promotion leading to consumer demand for fossil fuel-dependent devices. Culturally, a car should be an everday means to go from A to B in the safest most efficient way possible. When I see back to back, slick ads for huge SUVs during sports shows, it saddens me. We can do with the same car bought today for at least 10 years if they are designed reliably and efficiently. Much as we don't need a new iPhone every year, costing more than most desktop PCs, we don't need a new vehicle every few years. In fact, the way that things are moving, the personal vehicle market SHOULD fall, replaced by on-demand, driverless vehicles over time.
e. In Europe, I fully understand the ban on super-short flights. In a place like France, where successive governments have co-invested with private industry for two generations in high speed rail, powered by electricity, there is already little demand for most domestic flights in a country the size of Texas. Door to door, it is faster and simpler to go from Paris to Bordeaux, some 300 miles, by a two hour train ride, than by flying. Ryanair is the only ultra-cheap provider, and they do so by a) getting small town to lease slots very cheaply, b) having very infrequent flights, c) cancelling flights at last minute when there is insufficient load factor, and d) bait and switch fares. When it takes only 2h30 from the center of London to the center of Paris by Eurostar, there is little justification for much more polluting and unreliable flights.
f. Although they may represent a small percent of total ozone-depleting pollutants, the symbolism that the rich can destroy a common good with impunity is powerful. Private jets have little real utility in the overall functioning of the world, and they are astronomically more polluting per passenger mile than large jets. Can a "celebrity" not "make do" with a first class ticket and even chauffeured limousing gate to gate service? There is no need for anyone to claim that the speed of a private jet is essential with the possible exception of international civil servants working to negotiate the prevention of humanitarian disaster, or world leaders heading to a meeting, when telepresence won't do, for the betterment of most people. Aircraft do not produce most of the airborne pollutants, but they do so at the higher, more fragile altitudes where the ozone lawyer is essential to minimizing damaging solar rays from reaching the ground.
Just another way for those capitals to increase the prices and earn more money, of course these costs will be passed onto the customers and even more. they actually did nothing to prevent environmental harm.
Ben for president!
Yeah, let's make people pay more to fight the...weather?
The rich will fly anyway .
Let the poor stay home.
The ruse is that it’s for the environment, the reality is that is keeps bloated legacy airlines in business and safe from competition.
The middle class has voted in the nanny state and this is what they get for doing so.
are you sure it was the middle class?
The middle class is who gets holding the bag for all of this to the benefit of lower income people and driven by ideologies of wealthy people for whom money is not a factor
Any proposal in aviation that doesn’t start with private jets is a complete joke. Tax them to hell
There is one often overlooked example of government regulations aimed save the planet. The example is banning Freon - the most efficient family of refrigerants - from the use in order to preserve the ozone layer. Currently, the ozone hole is the smallest on record, freon is banned in western countries, and is widely used in China. Meanwhile new refrigerants that require new equipment are rolled out every year while previous versions are getting banned....
There is one often overlooked example of government regulations aimed save the planet. The example is banning Freon - the most efficient family of refrigerants - from the use in order to preserve the ozone layer. Currently, the ozone hole is the smallest on record, freon is banned in western countries, and is widely used in China. Meanwhile new refrigerants that require new equipment are rolled out every year while previous versions are getting banned. The whole industry is fueled by the ever changing regulation cycles with no end in sight...
You do realise that the implementation to the Montreal protocol to regulate the use of CFCs is the reason we have the smallest hole in the ozone layer for decades, and this is exactly the model for global action on climate change?
The refrigerants we have today are absolutely fit for purpose, and the idea that ‘new equipment. Has to get rolled out every year’ is utterly ridiculous. Yes there is change but it’s been...
You do realise that the implementation to the Montreal protocol to regulate the use of CFCs is the reason we have the smallest hole in the ozone layer for decades, and this is exactly the model for global action on climate change?
The refrigerants we have today are absolutely fit for purpose, and the idea that ‘new equipment. Has to get rolled out every year’ is utterly ridiculous. Yes there is change but it’s been gradual and incremental. HVAC units aren’t getting pulled every year to accommodate this.
In actuality the amount of Freon being released has not decreased. Air conditioning systems do not release Freon except when they leak, it is not consumed. In the meantime, China uses and released huge amounts of Freon in production of Styrofoam and similar.
How many of the climate activists shop on Amazon and have their packages delivered to their houses? If we were to stop deliveries, packaging etc it would have a much bigger positive impact than banning airtravel.
Great comment on Private Jets contributing much more to emissions per capita than commercial.
And this is why we will never save the planet. Everyone blames everyone else for the problem.
Humans are inherently selfish beings, and we are now being the consequences of that.
"Save the planet" from what? Earth has never had the same climate for any geologically significant period of time, and nothing that a bunch of a semi-hairless 2legged apes do, will change that.
The climate WILL radically change (no matter what humans do/don't do); the overwhelming majority of extant species WILL go extinct in due time as a result of it, as they have throughout the millennia; and the best thing we can do is...
"Save the planet" from what? Earth has never had the same climate for any geologically significant period of time, and nothing that a bunch of a semi-hairless 2legged apes do, will change that.
The climate WILL radically change (no matter what humans do/don't do); the overwhelming majority of extant species WILL go extinct in due time as a result of it, as they have throughout the millennia; and the best thing we can do is take measurable and strategic decisions as to how to minimize its affects, within the time we have left.
Ignoring climate change as a hoax (on one side), or being naive enough to believe you could ever stop it (on the other side).... don't help.
Ben, don't forget one thing the French have conveniently blocked: the air traffic Single European Sky initiative, which if enacted could singlehandly cut CO2 emissions by 10%.
In Germany, they tax the heck out of tickets and the LH Group is free to buy any competition and block access (at least viable amounts of it), in the Netherlands, they eliminate airport slots, and the UK won't build anything new aviation related which forces prices higher and higher. In the US, it isn't aviation but everything else in the American home that uses energy that is having new technologies forced on it that...
In Germany, they tax the heck out of tickets and the LH Group is free to buy any competition and block access (at least viable amounts of it), in the Netherlands, they eliminate airport slots, and the UK won't build anything new aviation related which forces prices higher and higher. In the US, it isn't aviation but everything else in the American home that uses energy that is having new technologies forced on it that will force up the prices of new appliances. And Europeans are doing all of that too.
It is clear that the goal of environmentalists is to eliminate the ability of everyday people to live a viable lifestyle while the ruling class continues to enjoy those benefits.
That said, it is doubtful that EUR 10 intra-country transportation makes economic sense and probably isn't profitable. France, like Germany, just happens to be large enough that trains aren't the best solution for every route and a fare that low over a distance for a one hour or more flight is not just an environmental question but whether public infrastructure should be invested for fares that low.
Name one thing Liberals havent ruined.
Even if all flying around the world was banned, global emissions would drop by just 2%. Airplanes are not the problem, especially considering that per passenger MGP is 85-105 for modern planes when at (typical) capacity. You can look at any US airline 10-K and see they all have around 80 MPG (ASM/Fuel) across their operation. Limiting auto emissions is so much simpler and would have a much bigger impact. Getting a quarter of vehicle...
Even if all flying around the world was banned, global emissions would drop by just 2%. Airplanes are not the problem, especially considering that per passenger MGP is 85-105 for modern planes when at (typical) capacity. You can look at any US airline 10-K and see they all have around 80 MPG (ASM/Fuel) across their operation. Limiting auto emissions is so much simpler and would have a much bigger impact. Getting a quarter of vehicle trips replaced by greener transport or eliminated would take care of all aviation impact.
@ DFW Flyer;
Almost completely right. Add a ban of China and a ban of all vessels. I'm getting crazy about those so called climate changers. Not ONE transport way is more "greener" than aviation. Just like those trains and tesla's...does electricity grow on trees??
Per capita energy consumption wise, the developed world consumes way more than the Chinese. Should they also eat less per capita, just because their total population size is large?
The US, in particular, is one of the most wasteful nations in the world, and should really take a long look at itself.
The US as a whole indeed. Individual states have certain initiatives such as California where the population are generally aware of climate and pollution. For example they have used paper bags in supermarkets for decades there. The problem is the entire country as individual states aren’t as progressive and have different regulations, if any.
After prisoner P01135809 pulled out of the Paris Accord, California maintained it.
You can see that with regards...
The US as a whole indeed. Individual states have certain initiatives such as California where the population are generally aware of climate and pollution. For example they have used paper bags in supermarkets for decades there. The problem is the entire country as individual states aren’t as progressive and have different regulations, if any.
After prisoner P01135809 pulled out of the Paris Accord, California maintained it.
You can see that with regards to dozens of other laws which I won’t mention here.
No but in France <10% of electricity comes from fossil fuels. Therefore driving a Tesla or taking the TGV will have a lower carbon footprint than flying.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_France
Is it far too late to save the world from climate change. These freak weather events that make the news daily are the new normal.
There just isn't the worldwide appetite to take immediate and drastic action (like banning all non-essential air travel) to turn around the damage that has already been done.
Enjoy what's left, and don't have children, I say.
Agreed, well said.
Eco hysteria pushing to destroy our economy freedoms - economic and otherwise. The true end game of how Marxism took cover in the environmental movement getting closer to achieving the long con. ♂️
This is all a con. A long con.
In the meantime thousands of guys are attending yearly the WEF in ZRH with private jets to discuss... CLIMATE CHANGE. And so many other events like COP's etc...
A better option would be to just ban france :)
This is only gonna get more common tho, they will be trying to limit the amount regular people can travel and the go to option for that is to price ppl out of it. This is going to be a pox that spreads throughout europe under the pretense of 'waaaa climate'.
It is, after all, politically expedient to effect legislation that's highly visible but minimally impactful, than to do something substantive but doesn't have visibility.
Thank god I live in America, where we can not be pressured by the government to do anything for the environment. Who cares if we're the biggest contributors of CO2 per capita, we have money and we should be allowed to spend it, fly, make mileage runs however the hell we want.
Just like guns, it's a right to do whatever we want when we have the money to do it.
Absolutely ppl should be able to fly whenever they wish. Climate change is nice an easy excuse to use to put through govt changes, raise taxes etc. Give it another 15 years and electric cars will be the target for whatever reason is convenient at the time to get more cash.
Typical Yankee Doodle Republican response. You don’t care about 98% of the population. It’s not just the environment here I’m referring to as you don’t care about anything else.
You're absolutely right, JP. We live in a FREE COUNTRY. France can ban planes and ride bikes everywhere they want, but the constitution guarantees us a right to fly wherever we want, whenever we can't. It's called Liberty... Learn about it, France.
I don't even know how to count to CO2.