When booking with the LH Group, if you have a bad conscience about flying, you can currently decide: either you book a “green fare” or you donate a few euros to strange climate projects – but that will soon change.
If you book on the Austrian website, for example, there are several tariffs available: There are four economy and three business tariffs. The tariffs labeled "Economy Green" or "Business Green" are highlighted in color. They are not exactly cheap, but they are attractive: rebooking is possible with the eco variant, luggage and seat reservation are included, as is SAF fuel to fly more sustainably - is this the tariff to ease your conscience?
What does “SAF” mean
SAF means “Ssustainable Aviation Fuel" (sustainable fuel), which is produced without fossil components, e.g. from biomass, waste oils, fats, but costs about three times as much per ton as kerosene.
If passengers opt for the "Green" tariff, the airline buys the corresponding amount from ÖMV and uses it to fuel a flight every few weeks. However, the amount of SAF fuel purchased is extremely small.
Austrian's press department has issued a restriction: only 20% of the "Green Fare" surcharge will be used to purchase SAF, the other part will be invested in "other climate protection projects". It is not explained why.
“The hut doesn’t exist!”
You can participate in these “other climate protection projects” during the booking process even without a “Green Fare” by selecting a different tariff by moving a slider from around €2 to €30. This means you are donating to individual climate projects that are selected by the compensation provider Climate Austria (part of Kommunalkredit) according to incomprehensible criteria. Together with the Lufthansa Group, the projects cover several locations worldwide, which involve reforestation, changing heating systems, supplying households with energy, CO2 Storage in concrete, among other things. In Austria, Climate Austria projects, which are financed by AUA and other companies, promote the construction of renewable energy plants and energy efficiency measures.
On its homepage, Austrian cites a certain “Blauspitz Hütte” (Kals am Großglockner) as an example of a project, where a diesel generator was allegedly replaced by photovoltaics.
But this hut does not exist. And the photo on the AUA website shows a completely different hut. The Kals tourist information office says: “Unfortunately, there is no Blauspitzhütte here in Kals.”
When asked, Philipp Trummer from Climate Austria admits that there is a “Project was accidentally misnamed or colloquially namedThe correct answer would be the “Kals – Matreier – Törl- Haus”, which was equipped with PV in 2020. The AUA (which has no idea about these details at all, but collects money from customers for projects, note) mistakenly took this over. However, Climate Austria did not want to provide a photo of the subsidized object, claiming that they have “no released photos for use by third parties.” The hut tenant also did not respond to a request for a photo. Is this how you build trust with donors? Not really!
It is easy to see that the individual projects, scattered around the world and difficult to verify, are nothing more than a nice climate goodie, but have no relevance whatsoever for the global climate balance. It is annoying for customers when they donate to projects but are given only empty phrases and incomprehensible project goals instead of detailed information. For the climate (and your own wallet) it is certainly better to put a private PV system on your roof, drive less or forego some flights.
Hardly relevant
To get a rough idea of the relevance of the voluntary environmental surcharge, Anna Pachinger from the Austrian Press Department says: “Currently, around 3-5% of our passengers take advantage of a CO2 offset offer. We aim to continuously increase this percentage." She also says that by 2022, the entire “Lufthansa Group used around 13.000 tonnes of SAF. That was almost 0,2% of the total fuel requirements of the Lufthansa Group (7,6 million tonnes).” The Lufthansa Group aims to increase this share to one million tonnes by 2030.
Surcharge comes
From 2025, there will be a mandatory SAF surcharge, which is already being levied for departures from next year in 27 EU countries. The ridiculously low surcharge will be up to €5 on economy tickets in Europe, and up to a maximum of €72 on long-haul flights. LH wants to use this to finance an addition of 2% SAF to all flights. It is doubtful whether this will really work.
But it would be more important to clarify other questions: Couldn’t the number of flights be reduced somehow? Do there really have to be 11 to 12 flights for Tag from Vienna to Frankfurt, or up to 10 flights to Zurich, or 25 flights from Frankfurt to London? Wouldn't fewer flights with more seats be enough? Can travelers be expected to wait an hour longer for a flight? And does every short-haul flight (despite its economic importance) have to be served by plane? There are at least some approaches: Austrian has been stopping some ultra-short flights for years, but now Lufthansa is picking up more than a third of the former VIE passengers from Salzburg and Linz to Germany, many travel by car, only a few by train. Lufthansa continues to serve short routes in Germany despite good train connections.
The mandatory SAF surcharge obviously helps more with refueling than the voluntary minimum amount, but it also has only a small impact. Taxing kerosene could change travel behavior. Legal minimum flight prices that at least cover taxes and fees are currently no longer an issue. The train, which is outrageously expensive for international travel, should finally be made cheaper and better coordinated internationally.
This post was written by: Mag.Wolfgang Ludwig.
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