I think that there's some evidence, as some business travel has been replaced by video meetings. However the stats I've read suggest business travel makes up less than 15% of air travel in terms of passenger numbers, so the difference may not be huge. It's a bit more complex than that, because business travel is more profitable, and if it declines, prices for leisure travel may go up, reducing the numbers further. But so far it's probably not a huge difference.
The CO2 emissions from all air flights are only about 6-7% of total CO2 emissions. So 15% of 7% is not much at all (1.05%) but the individual emissions of someone like Bill Gates who hops on a private jet as I do my electric bike are very large. It is undboubtedly the case that he knocks off thousands of tonnes of CO2 all by his little self every year whereas I'm likely doing 3-4 tonnes a year (as long as I don't go to Melbourne). So ridding him from the biome would do a lot more good for the rest of the world than me performing hari kari.
The question though is it really CO2 which is the driving force behind any warming? As water vapour, methane are more active agents and water vapor is a lot larger concentration in the atmosphere normally (up to 100 times). Clouds are also a warming agent as we all should know from the cloudless nights in the middle of winter. So it would seem to me that industrial pollution would also be a warming agent.
And CO2 is just a little too convenient for the dystopians out there who would like to lay the blame, as always, on the lower middle and working classes.
I'm writing, but the aim of "talking about climate change" is to help people have better conversations about climate change, hence the name.
I think that there's some evidence, as some business travel has been replaced by video meetings. However the stats I've read suggest business travel makes up less than 15% of air travel in terms of passenger numbers, so the difference may not be huge. It's a bit more complex than that, because business travel is more profitable, and if it declines, prices for leisure travel may go up, reducing the numbers further. But so far it's probably not a huge difference.
The CO2 emissions from all air flights are only about 6-7% of total CO2 emissions. So 15% of 7% is not much at all (1.05%) but the individual emissions of someone like Bill Gates who hops on a private jet as I do my electric bike are very large. It is undboubtedly the case that he knocks off thousands of tonnes of CO2 all by his little self every year whereas I'm likely doing 3-4 tonnes a year (as long as I don't go to Melbourne). So ridding him from the biome would do a lot more good for the rest of the world than me performing hari kari.
The question though is it really CO2 which is the driving force behind any warming? As water vapour, methane are more active agents and water vapor is a lot larger concentration in the atmosphere normally (up to 100 times). Clouds are also a warming agent as we all should know from the cloudless nights in the middle of winter. So it would seem to me that industrial pollution would also be a warming agent.
And CO2 is just a little too convenient for the dystopians out there who would like to lay the blame, as always, on the lower middle and working classes.