5 things we can all do to make net zero in tourism a true possibility

As with every other economic activity, tourism destinations and businesses must urgently reduce their emissions towards zero by 2050 or sooner to meet internationally agreed targets. For any sector, this will be a challenge. However, the travel industry is dependent on aviation. Our report, Envisioning Tourism in 2030, shows how flying was responsible for 55% of all tourism’s transport and accommodation-related emissions in 2019, but was only 23% of all trips taken. And long haul flights are particularly polluting. Longest distance trips (over 16,000kms return trip, equivalent to flying from Shanghai to Sydney – or further – and back), were responsible for 19% of all tourism’s global carbon emission, yet accounted for just 1.9% of all trips. So clearly, any plan for decarbonising travel and tourism needs to grasp this nettle.

Our report, developed with the Centre of Expertise in Leisure, Tourism and Hospitality, the Breda University of Applied Sciences, the European Tourism Futures Institute, and the Netherlands Board of Tourism and Conventions, highlights some issues to overcome:

Aviation’s footprint is set to get much bigger. Under business as usual, flying is set to grow rapidly. If left unchecked, those longest-haul trips will quadruple by 2050, accounting for 41% of tourism’s total emissions yet still just 4% of all trips. In fact, continuing with business as usual would require a staggering 66% of the remaining global climate budget available between 2023 and 2100 (leaving just 34% for everything else we do when not travelling).
There isn’t a silver bullet solution. Decarbonisation won’t be easy for anyone, but at least road and rail transport providers, ferry and hotel companies understand they can decarbonise through electrification and investment in renewable energy – solutions that are readily available. Unfortunately we are many decades off from having global fleets of electric planes, especially for long haul trips. Another alternative to fossil fuels is so-called sustainable aviation fuels (SAF). But in 2019 the amount of SAF produced globally was only 0.1% of the 300 million tons of jet fuel used in commercial aviation. As Delta airlines puts it: “Sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) is the most promising lever known today to accelerate progress toward a net zero future… Unfortunately, there isn’t enough SAF today to fuel an airline Delta’s size for a single day.” Growing biofuels SAF production from this tiny base is also problematic, as for biofuels there are limitations around land use and availability of organic waste (so in our model we use synthetic e-fuels).
The aviation industry largely sits outside of the travel industry. Despite flying being an essential component for many tourism products and destinations, the tourism sector has little influence over the development of routes and much less over government and airline investments in R&D and new technologies. And so tourism remains trapped: holding back on growth in flights is more likely to mean losing out to competitors, rather than actual reductions in global emissions (unless mindsets and marketing can shift towards regional and domestic tourism). And here we also touch on issues of equity: why shouldn’t developing economies build new airports? How should we support island nations and more remote places which depend the most on aviation for connectivity?

So what is to be done? Despite the considerable challenges ahead, and the lack of action until now which has narrowed our options, our research did find one scenario still available to us that keeps the world travelling – and flying – while reaching net zero. It allows for similar levels of growth in trips and revenue as business as usual, and is a positive vision of tourism thriving within ecological boundaries. For this to happen, we need to slow down the global growth of aviation, and keep overall distances travelled by air to around 2019 levels. Coupled with multi-trillion dollar investment, this provides a window of opportunity for building SAF (specifically, e-fuels) capacity to catch up with demand and eventually cover 100% of aviation needs by 2050. Is this going to happen? Some say it is naïve to think so. Our report simply concludes that this is the only viable scenario, and the alternatives are worse for the planet and for tourism. This scenario is possible, it allows people to continue travelling by growing the sector in other ways (emphasising shorter-haul trips by land and sea), and the investment required is no more than 2-3% of overall revenue across the same period (and that investment is likely to yield good returns). But we do not say our scenario is likely. That requires political will and having the right business incentives for change.

As such, many of the recommendations in our report are aimed at high-level governments and policymakers – because we need the investments, incentives and rules of the game to be reset at a global scale. But here are five practical things that all of us working in travel and tourism can do now:

Support the call for global coordination of policies, innovation, investment and data whenever you get the chance – at conferences, in articles, in discussions with suppliers, when speaking to ministers. We need a travel and tourism system that works for the planet and the people on it.

Evaluate your long-term planning against the decarbonisation scenario. Better understand how your organisation or destination will operate in a decarbonising world, and consider the gap between where you are and where you need to be. Question any plans that rely on growth from long haul markets, and have greater confidence in plans that tap into the growth areas we identify in the report.

Ensure emissions from travel to and from the destination are fully accounted for in tourism plans, and recognise carbon as a “cost” when developing new products and growing markets.

Start identifying and providing low and net-zero emissions tourism options. We should be seeing more and more of these coming to market within this decade. Where will yours come from?

Sign and implement the Glasgow Declaration. This is the UN’s global initiative where you can align with others and find support to take action. We are an implementation partner, helping destinations, in particular, to better understand the critical role they can play.