Title: Does an offset in the airlines' emission of CO₂ make any difference?

Authors: Alberto Boretti

Addresses: Prince Mohammad Bin Fahd University, P.O. Box 1664, Al Khobar 31952, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

Abstract: The airlines' emission of CO₂ was considered a major environmental threat to the environment, driving the need for immediate carbon offsets and drastic reductions by 2050. The Covid19 'experiment' demonstrates as a drastic reduction of the airlines' emission of CO₂ over 1 year had no impact on the atmospheric concentration of CO₂. The atmospheric concentration of CO₂ is the result of a much more complex situation where the changes to the environment, in general, depend on many anthropogenic and natural forcings. This makes the offset of the airlines' emission of CO₂ a purely philosophical exercise unable to make any difference in the real world.

Keywords: Covid19; fossil fuel emissions; airlines' emission of CO₂; carbon offset; atmospheric concentration of CO₂.

DOI: 10.1504/IJGW.2021.118358

International Journal of Global Warming, 2021 Vol.25 No.2, pp.168 - 176

Received: 28 Dec 2020
Accepted: 16 Feb 2021
Published online: 23 Oct 2021 *

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