Reducing Consumption to Avert Catastrophic Global Climate Change: The Case of Aviation

Abstract

Avoiding potentially catastrophic global climate change is a moral imperative, demanding signi- ficant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions from all important transport sectors, including aviation. However, because passenger flights and freight traffic are increasing much faster than efficiency improvements, the aviation sec- tor will not be able to reduce emissions, or even stabilize them at current levels, without direct, forceful action to reduce demand. This paper re- views the ethical principles and empirical reali- ties supporting the case for reducing worldwide aviation traffic. It argues that most passenger air travel and air freight shipping represents un- necessary luxury consumption, which respon- sible moral agents should willingly reduce in or- der to mitigate global climate change. It consid- ers several mechanisms for doing so, and con- tends that they may succeed, but only if com- bined with an explicit recognition and binding commitment that for the foreseeable future, avi- ation must be a slow-growth or no-growth sector of the world economy.