Smash hit

New punitive and regressive tax on air travel. I agree that Ryanair has an impeccably clean fleet and merits praise rather than rebuke from Ian Pearson M. P. The new tax is a non-electable racket (yet another)...talk about Pearson shooting himself in the foot! And all his inappropriate comments mounted against aviation and Ryanair in particular ignore the government permitting the railways to increase fares and reduce the number of carriages per train (First Great Western). It's time for the people to speak...roll on the general election. Derek F. Boucher, Southampton, Hants

someone should start pestering the Minister for Transport,because i was up in arms to find out that airport tax is going up on 1st of Feb this year, and passengers who booked their flights well advanced (before the 1st of Feb) will be charged the tax. Today i was inteviewed by the BBC news about this after my comment i made on their website (have your say) i was angry to hear that advanced passengers will have to pay for the new tax which comes into force on Feb 1st. I think that the Minister for Transport needs to rethink on this fast. Ryanair boss,also said that: any passengers who dont get a email from us,and dont pay the extra tax will not be able to fly. I got news for him,we will. david, London, United Kingdom

What a whole load of SENSE! I have also started to feel the puritan and even moralistic agenda of many so-called greens who are turning The Planet into a deity. I have been paying my respect to the local altar to The Planet (i.e. collecting my recyclables and bringing them to local recycling centre, out of some kind of 'social consience' I suppose) but what I would really like is efficient systems to do it for me so that I can continue being free from such mondane concernsand reap the rewards of our advanced civilisation and instead, spend my time reading, enjoying the opera, the local swimming pool and going on short weekend breaks! Louis Lemieux, London, UK

Articles like Tom Chesshyres today (13 Jan), only add to the confusion. A simple sum giving the weight of fuel on a plane, the proportion (and weight ) of that which is carbon and a formula for the combination of oxygen (from the air outside the plane)and carbon to produce carbon dioxide might make it easier to envision those tonnes of Co2. Anon

This is the first sensible, and though provoking, article I have read on this whole subject. Excellent! Geoffrey McNab, Belfast, Northern Ireland

This is a poorly researched article which is more personal wish fulfilment than journalism. Globally, aviation emissions currently account for a small part of CO2 emissions but this is not so if we look at the UK. (One could argue that we should be free to continue to fly as much as we want and that the rest of the world should stay at home, but let's assume that even Anatole is not that selfish.) According to the DfT, current UK emissions from flights are a little under 10MtC per annum. The DfT's (conservative) mid-range forecast is that this will rise to 17.4 MtC by 2050. The governmental target of reducing emissions by 60% by 2050 requires that total UK emissions are 65MtC by that date. So air travel is a very significant factor in the UK, and unchecked growth in the sector will almost certainly mean we fail to meet the 2050 target. If we unashamedly pursue our unsustainable lifestyles we have little right to ask the rest of the world to set their house in order! Jon Woolf, Liverpool, UK

I found Anatole Kaletsky's article on climate change and flying full of hot air and his normally sound logic lacking in many respects. I would just like to highlight one of these. His conclusion that economic self-interest offers the only solution to global warming is rather undermined by the reasons behind the cutting of the rainforests in Brazil and Indonesia. There is such widespread destruction of rainforests purely because of economic self-interest, be it palm oil production in Indonesia or cattle/chicken rearing in Brazil. As the Stern report identified global warming is a result of massive market failure. To rely on the economic market to resolve this problem is preposterous. Jeremy Hunter, Basingstoke, Hants

Each time i click on Comments, up pops a box inviting me to post one, but no (existing) comments. Since Post a Comment is preceded with a few chatty words (presumably from a thread) I suspect your code has become mangled. Colin, Antibes, France

Good article - points well made. without air travel the world economy would slow, so carbon trading may be the best solution.biofuels are not far away from being viable as kerosene replacement. In terms of the mathemetics of the components of carbon emissions cited by Anarole Kaletsky, 3+10+14+14+24+18 =83%. what makes up the other17%? Nick Marmont, milland, west sussex

You are 100% CORRECT. Present green action seems to be driven by illogical do-gooders motivated by their need to feel good factor but having negligeable effect at a global level. Alan Tucker, Slough, UK

I hope Anatole gets a few free flights in gratitude for this article, He forgot to mention that aircraft emissions are much dirtier than those of road transport, central heating and power stations. These dirty exhaust gases are emitted at altitudes of 30,000 to 35,000 feet - way above the cloud layers - and are not washed down but stay around for years while the nitrogen oxides attack the thinning ozone layer. Future generations will look back at the selfish world in which allows the unrestrained burning of millions of tons of fossil fuel every year. Anatole, there is only one way forward TAX THE FUEL and save some for tomorrow. I am not a *Puritan ideologue*, just an old technologist with concerns for future generations. G Woods, Manchester, UK

Well said. I am very frustrated by the emissions becoming polarized between headline grabbing views on 4x4's air travel etc. with the economy and choice in the other corner. This causes the main opportunities, such as heat pumps, bio mass etc.to be largely ignored. These are deliverable now and should have a real economic benefit as well as an environmental one. Heat pumps can also be upgraded later if solar or other forms of electrical generation such as fuel cells, become viable in the future. They only need 25% of the energy required by a conventional heating system to drive and electric pump. CHRIS WILLIAMS, Winster, UK

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