FOLLOWING in Tory leader David Cameron’s footsteps to the Arctic could be helping to ruin the very thing that tourists want to see, according to an adventure travel company.

Pen Hadow Travel has started to scale back the trips it offers to the poles, though it is continuing to advertise about ten holidays a year.

Pen Hadow, the explorer, who runs Pen Hadow Travel, says that he recently considered cancelling holidays altogether after having a crisis of confidence over the link between tourism and global warming.

Hadow, 44, who was the first person to trek solo from Canada to the North Geographic Pole without supplies, in 2003, believes that emissions from aircraft are directly responsible for a thinning of the ice caps — which is why he has decided to reduce the number of trips he sells.

But his company can still arrange 25-day “South Geographic Pole” trips from about £27,000, including business-class flights from London, or four-day breaks for a long weekend’s dog sledding in Norway for £1,000 — similar to David Cameron’s trip to Norway last month.

“All the evidence shows that the ice caps are melting and planes are contributing to that,” said Hadow. “The thickness of ice in the Arctic has dropped by as much as 25 per cent to 9ft (2.75m) of thickness since the 1970s.

“I considered cancelling trips altogether. But we’re talking about 10 to 50 tourists a year. The actual impact they make is infinitesimal. Even at that level I feel very uncomfortable as our trips are inevitably very flight based, with relatively long flights.”

Hadow’s company announced this week that it will voluntarily donate cash to a carbon-balancing programme that will spend £15-£75 for every one of their customers on planting trees. It will also provide customers with long-life low-energy light bulbs.

These moves are part of a campaign to “turn polar travel green”, although many “green” travel companies believe there is an inherent contradiction among those who say they have green credentials and offer trips on aircraft.

Justin Francis, co-founder of the online travel agency Responsibletravel.com, said: “If you are sending people away to see the ice caps melt before their eyes, and in a small part you are responsible for that melting, it is difficult to square this with running a campaign raising awareness about the damage planes cause.”

Francis welcomed the tree-planting contributions being made by Pen Hadow Travel, but said: “It’s nothing new, not a first or a ‘solution’.”

He added that ultimately it is the responsibility of governments to introduce “green” taxes on airlines.

Only a few hundred people go on ice-breaker ships into the Arctic Ocean and to Antarctica each year, but as many as 10,000 a year take cruises in the Arctic regions.

Other travel firms offering trips, such as Norwegian Coastal Voyage, Exodus and Quark Expeditions, ask customers to make voluntary contributions to carbon-offsetting schemes.

Paul Goldstein, from Exodus, which offers fortnight trips to Antarctica, said: “Every one of our customers is seriously encouraged to carbon balance.”

Hadow’s company was among the first to offer polar trips when it began in 1995. He says that he has seen considerable evidence of ice cap melting on his explorations — he was forced to swim during one part of his 2003 North Pole trip.

Details: Pen Hadow Travel (020-8399 6327, www.penhadowtravel.com) Exodus (020-8772 3703, www.exodus.co.uk).

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