“…said representatives of the campaign group, Plane Stupid.” The words fell out of the mouth of Jeremy Paxman, the UK’s most acerbic newsreader, like a river of foul-tasting spittle. I know how he feels.

With aircraft emissions rising exponentially, promising to undo any carbon reduction measures that governments put in place because they fawn in the face of business might and the “right” of people in the industrial West to fly, you would think that a key enemy of the environmental movement would be the entire flying culture. But we see Sierra Club sending their supporters around the world by plane, government ministers and their advisers flying by their thousands to “environmental” conferences, and (I have it on good authority) leaders of mainstream environmental organisations taking holidays across the world by jet because…well, I can’t think of an acceptable excuse – can you?

Then we have Plane Stupid: the brainchild of a number Climate Camp protestors along with Greenpeace staffers, who have been in the press recently for unfurling a couple of banners on top of the Houses of Parliament, and who are now organising a “flash mob” for the grand opening of Heathrow Terminal 5 (see above, sort of ;-) ).

“Be at T5 International Arrivals at 11am to put on (or strip to reveal) your brightly coloured ‘STOP AIRPORT EXPANSION’ t-shirt: a visible presence of public opposition to the madness of airport expansion. Wander round, have a coffee, leave when you like.” (from http://t5flashmob.files.wordpress.com/2008/02/flashmobflyer2.pdf)

You may well ask me: “What’s wrong with that?” Nothing, actually, if there was any chance of any of this activity making any difference whatsoever. As I have written on The Earth Blog:

“It becomes increasingly clear – the more you look at them – that most of the campaigns fought by large environmental groups not only sit squarely in the comfort zone of that group’s supporters and leaders, but also conveniently sit in the comfort zones of the very companies and governments the campaigns are targeted at.”

Where, in any of Plane Stupid’s materials, in anything they say in the media (after all, media attention is what they crave) is a direct call for the public to stop flying NOW because if they don’t stop then the airports will keep expanding, the planes will keep flying and the Earth will keep heating? Where is the advice to keep on at your friends and relatives to stop their senseless airbound journeys? Why are the media who promote air travel not being attacked for being tools of industry?

I’ll tell you why.

It’s because organisations like Plane Stupid / Greenpeace, Friends Of The Earth, Sierra Club, WWF are scared of alienating their audience, their friends in the media and, most of all, their own people who still can’t bear to admit that they are as much a part of the machine as big business. I know people who have been sacked from and ostracised by these organisations for daring to suggest that protests, petitions, banners and marches don’t work. They don’t, and neither do Flash Mobs.

And the sad thing is, the organisations know it – but still won’t admit that they have wasted decades trying to do things the nice way.

Before someone decides to prevent me ever writing for any newspaper ever again (and by God, I’ve burnt a few bridges already!) I will say that I actually like The Independent. Of all the national newspapers in the UK it is by far the best for giving environmental issues a high profile, and saying what it thinks.

The paper recently ran an excellent article on the Open Skies Agreement, which will ensure the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by transatlantic aircraft goes well over what the smug naysayers in the air industry are claiming. This was backed up a Leader, which stated:

As this newspaper has long argued, the best way to do this is to start taxing the aviation industry fairly and properly. It is time that the price of air travel corresponded more closely with its environmental costs. The fact that airlines, by international convention, have never been subject to fuel tax or VAT has amounted to a vast hidden subsidy to this method of transport and one that urgently needs to be removed.

So why, in all that is sacred, are they running adverts that make them look like hypocrites? The picture above is a perfect example. A decent article about the dangers of air transport expansion nicely juxtaposed with an advert for long-haul flight behemoths, Emirates. And not just any old advert: one with interactive features to allow you to see the luxury inside one of their specially fitted-out Boeing or Airbus aircraft. Way to go, web designers!

In case the editors were wondering how bad Emirates is, according to their annual report for 2006-2007, the average Emirates passenger flew 4,400km, which produces about 0.62 tonnes of carbon dioxide. They carried 17.5 million passengers, which means that, in 2006/7, Emirates Airlines emitted around 10.8 million tonnes of carbon dioxide: about the same as the whole of Jamaica emitted in the same year.

Not the best company to give space to in your Climate Change section.

Can we really put the blame on UPS for having it’s own airport terminals, having a fleet of jumbo jets, and using air as the standard method of transporting packages around the world? Don’t decide yet; wait until the end of this little article.

Ok, here’s a quote from the UPS web site:

“Our comprehensive hub-and-spoke network provides you with access to key transportation centers across the U.S. and beyond. Our all-points international air hub is located in Louisville, KY, with other regional hubs located in strategic cities across the U.S. We cover the rest of the world, as well, by operating international air hubs in Miami, Hamilton, Cologne, Taipei, and the Philippines.”

And here’s another:

“On Monday, February 1, 1988, UPS operated the first two flights under its own aircraft operating certificate. Now, every hour of the day, 365 days a year, a UPS aircraft is flying somewhere in the world – moving packages and freight.”

Surely this is just part of the way things are. Watching Tom Hanks being the perfect courier, taking pride in his company’s performance in the movie “Castaway” (ok, so FedEx sponsored it, but you get the picture) warms the cockles of even the most cold-hearted sceptic. This is what UPS do, and have been doing at a faster and faster rate for 101 years.

Here are the hard facts:

1) UPS claim to be an environmentally responsible company. They have their own Sustainability pages and say:

“We conduct our business and operations with consideration for their environmental impact. Our responsibility for the environment ranges from the construction, maintenance, and operation of our facilities, to the maintenance and operation of our vehicles and aircraft, to the conservation of resources.”

2) UPS operate the world’s 9th (or possibly 8th) largest airline, comprising 268 owned aircraft and another 311 chartered, ranging from Boeing 727s to 747s in size.

3) In 2006 UPS’s USA freight emissions produced (according to UPS) 7.37 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (includes other greenhouse gases). This is about the same as the entire annual emissions for Honduras.

4) UPS do not publish their global aircraft emissions figures, instead they show the carbon intensity (the figure that companies and governments use when their overall emissions are going up). It is currently 0.81 kg of some kind of emissions – it doesn’t say what, but we have to assume it’s carbon dioxide – per tonne of cargo.

5) Extrapolating the figures from UPS’s own Worldwide Facts list; if you take the 1.8 million parcels and documents per day, average the weight at 500g (I’m being very conservative here), multiply by 365, you get 330,000 tonnes of air freight. This means that UPS produce an extra…hang on! This doesn’t make sense!

Dig a bit deeper, and you find that the carbon intensity figure is a complete fudge.

“UPS’s (U.S.) absolute CO2 emissions increased by 1% from 2003 to 2004.
However, UPS’s CO2 efficiency improved 2.8 percent. We produced .06 metric tonnes (60 kilograms)less CO2 emissions per 1,000 packages delivered than we did in 2003.” (http://www.cdproject.net/download.asp?file=CDP3_UPS_AQ_3453.pdf)

This means that, assuming the UPS figures are correct, 0.81 on their chart actually means 2.4 tonnes per 1000 packages. We can now use that figure to show that the 657 million international packages per year produces another 1.3 million tonnes of carbon dioxide.

Quite why UPS are so cagey about this figure I have no idea, but it suggests they are not quite so comfortable about their emissions as their environmental pages suggest. But, can we pin the blame on UPS for producing all these emissions?

Not quite. Businesses and increasingly individuals are demanding rapid transportation of goods around the world, and the companies that offer the quickest service are the companies who will get the lion’s share of the custom. UPS are responding to a global demand for rapid transport, and as a consequence of their size they have a lot of aircraft, a lot of trucks and a lot of vans. So, it appears that the businesses who want things NOW have driven the growth of UPS rapid transportation, which has driven the growth of the emissions from freight transport.

However, isn’t it UPS’s CEO who says: “The global trends…are creating compelling growth opportunities for UPS.”

UPS are loving their position in the market, and they will continue to transport things faster and faster, producing more and more emissions because it is good for business – their business.

Just to conclude, I had to include this little snippet, from the Carbon Disclosure Project:

“What renewable energy and energy efficiency activities are you undertaking to manage your emissions? ”

“Solar power provides 70 percent of the power needs at our Palm Springs, Calif., sorting facility. Since its deployment in July 2003, the 100 kilowatt solar panel initiative has produced over 523,000 kilowatt hours of energy, reducing our CO2 output by 1 million pounds. This is the equivalent of removing 99 passenger cars from the road for a year.”

Wow! 1 millions pounds, or 500 tonnes, or 0.0002% of their total USA emissions per year! Possibly the most pathetic statistic I have so far read in 2008.