Eastern Airways, a UK based airline operating in the UK out of Norwich, has pushed for a reassessment of the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) reporting practices by the UK Government.
Eastern Airways chairman, Bryan Huxford, said, ‘The Emissions Trading Scheme, implemented by Brussels earlier this year is good in theory but, for Europe’s smaller carriers, is a disaster in practice’ says. ‘I find it unbelievable that the scheme results in the cost of administration equalling or exceeding the cost of compliance for smaller airlines.
Eastern Airways, together with every other European airline takes very seriously the need to minimise the impact of its flights on climate change, even though we already have an aircraft fleet that is extremely fuel efficient. However, the Emissions Trading Scheme for aviation, implemented by the European Community is far from being in the interests of Eastern Airways’ customers.
The high price of fuel already gives us the strongest possible incentive to be as fuel efficient as possible without the imposition of ETS. We do not object to buying the carbon allowances but we see no sense whatsoever in obliging our passengers to pay, through their fares, for complex and precise reporting procedures that contribute nothing to environmental protection.’
The airline expects that apart from global concerns, climate protection is also a concern for the airline because of its business interests. The ETS legislation will be expected to complicate administration of the fuel usage reporting, as cost of administration of the same would be more than the price of the carbon allowances the airline will be acquiring.
Mike Ambrose, the director general of the European Regions Airline Association (ERA), said, ‘Forcing small airlines to adopt reporting procedures that demand a level of precision many dimensions different from the inexactness of climate change science is absurd. If the European Commission and European Parliament members had listened to the industry when the scheme was drafted, such a ridiculous situation would have been avoided.
Earlier this month, David Cameron urged the EU to cut its bureaucracy. If the UK government fails to act to cut through this wasteful red tape, it will be passengers who will continue to fund this needless bureaucracy.’
