The European Union has imposed new guidelines for carbon emission standard. One of the areas that new guidelines are being imposed is in the airline industry. The Association of European Airlines (AEA) says will pose problems when trying to meet them because they do not have the money to fund all of the changes. On a brighter note the EU Director of General Climate Action announced the European Airlines will be participating in a cap and trade system that will hopefully reduce their emissions. If this is successful it should generate revenue for the airline industry. The resistance from the European Airlines is not the only obstacle that the European Union is struggling to reduce carbon emissions but other international airline industries do not want to make changes either. Even though the businesses do not want to make changes environmental groups are pushing for stricter guidelines to be put in place. It is reported in the article “Aviation currently represents three percent of carbon dioxide emissions worldwide. It is one of the fastest growing sources of man-made emissions.” Something needs to be done if we want to reduce climate change and air pollution. Humans are the only ones that can make the changes because we are the ones who cause the problem in the first place.
Much of the resistance for change comes from companies saying that they do not have the funds to make the changes to keep up with the new standards. Some of this could be true but I think the bigger issue is that political systems and our economic system drive some of the decisions that companies make. If the companies made the change that means that they would have to spend their money to make those changes. Forced changes such as these cause companies to produce goods or services for cheaper which can decrease quality or the consumer will have to end up paying more for the service. In the end the consumer will be affected by the decisions of the company or governmental policy. Most consumers support environmental movements and want to reduce our carbon footprint. This is just proof that sometime bigger intuitions inhibit change of an important problem such as the impact that humans have on the environment.
No comments:
Post a Comment