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Visit www.seat61.com for top tips on train travel. Written by Mark Smith AKA ‘the man in seat 61’ the site contains all you need to know about train travel!
To find out which airlines are offering the most carbon efficient flights you could visit the Carbon Friendly Flight Finder. This enables you to search and compare the cheapest and most environmentally friendly fares available.
Please note, The Travel Foundation is not able to take responsibility for the content of external sites.
You could consider offering a carbon offset scheme to your customers. Such schemes seek to offset unavoidable carbon dioxide through projects that reduce emissions elsewhere and bring economic and social benefits to communities in destinations. There are a range of schemes available, including ‘Reduce My Footprint’, which focuses on carbon reduction with offset options for emissions that cannot be reduced. Always remember though it is essential that companies and customers take all action possible to reduce carbon emissions and do not see carbon offsetting as a way to avoid action on carbon reduction.
Transport
Transport is intrinsic to the travel industry and does impact the global environment. Our challenge as an industry is to reduce emissions at the same time as maximising the benefits from tourism to local communities in destinations - many economies rely heavily on tourism.
With aviation being the major concern, we need to look at how we can take steps to reduce emissions from flying. Obviously, for long haul, there is no real alternative, although there are still ways for operators to become greener – encouraging clients to use overland transport instead of domestic flights is a great start.
Whether you are a long or short haul operator you should provide your customers with information about how they can use low impact transport options while they are in destination.
Offer maps of local walking routes and approach cycle hire companies to see what they might offer your customers – the benefits to clients are immense, offering them a more authentic experience of the country they are visiting.
Make sure that your ground handler is using a fleet of modern vehicles as new technologies mean these are often better for the environment.
For all the times when flights are unavoidable it is a good idea to help your customers follow these simple ‘fly smart’ guidelines to help them to fly more carbon efficiently:
- If possible ensure customers fly direct
- Choose an economy flight - emissions are generally less per person.
- Use airlines that fill their planes
- Encourage customers to carry less baggage
Case Study: Train Travel
Travelling by train can be cost effective, environmentally beneficial and not nearly as time consuming as you might think. A journey between London and Paris by Eurostar takes 2.5 hours and creates 22kg of CO2 per person compared with a flight which takes 3.5 hours and emits a massive 244kg CO2 per passenger.