CO2 emissions from private planes are skyrocketing

Carbon dioxide emissions from private jets have increased 46% over the past five years, according to a study published Thursday in the journal Nature Communications Earth & Environment.

Researchers analyzed more than 26,000 planes and 18 million trips, representing the majority of private flights between 2019 and 2023, and found that more than two-thirds of all private jets were based in the US.

“Believe [the paper] “It will be a benchmark for future studies,” said Christopher Jones, a carbon footprint researcher and director of the CoolClimate Network at UC Berkeley, who was not involved in the work. “They have really interesting analyzes about where people fly… It's a really interesting, thought-provoking document.”

The researchers also found that 291 of the flights were to the 2023 COP28 climate conference, collectively releasing 3,800 tons of carbon dioxide.

At the turn of the century, the Federal Aviation Administration pioneered technology that allows researchers to track private planes, but now the agency allows aircraft operators to hide their identification, potentially making similar studies impossible.

“We were lucky to conduct this study now,” said Stefan Gössling, lead author and professor of tourism research at Linnaeus University in Sweden. The current availability of comprehensive data motivated Gössling and his colleagues to conduct the first-of-its-kind assessment of global private jet travel.

As the United States aims to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions in its aviation industry by 2050, the study's authors say the results demonstrate the need for greater regulation.

However, since private jets account for only a fraction of a percent of total greenhouse gas emissions, Jones says the issue is ultimately more of a moral concern about wealth inequality than a pressing front in the race towards a carbon neutral world.

“Your personal carbon footprints…don't add up to as much as you think,” Jones said. “There's only so much food, only so many things, houses and flights you can take in a year.”

“It bothers people a lot to think about these rich individuals flying around without taking their carbon footprint into account. “I think it deserves some attention, but it can also be a distraction from some of the much larger problems that exist,” he said.

Emissions from air travel come disproportionately from the wealthy. A premium class seat is responsible for releasing five to nine times more carbon than an economy class seat.

And private jets (used by just 0.003% of the population) accounted for almost 2% of the industry's emissions. The worst offenders, Gössling says, can pollute 550 times more than the average person in a given year through private jet travel alone.

Although the study did not evaluate the cause of the increase, others have found that the COVID-19 pandemic has played a major role, as wealthier people, hoping to avoid possible exposure to the disease, opted for private flights in commercial place.

The study's authors also note that reducing emissions is particularly difficult amid continued growth in economic output and wealth.

Letting airplanes stop using carbon-based fuels would be much more difficult than for cars. Right now, batteries are simply too heavy to power commercial and private aircraft.

Instead, the FAA says achieving this will require developing lower-emitting aircraft technology, reducing the amount of fuel burned through better air traffic management, and ultimately investing in carbon capture technology to offset unavoidable emissions.

Although emissions from private aviation represent only a small fraction of the total emissions of all sectors worldwide, Gössling says holding the ultra-rich accountable is still important.

“I've already heard a large number of people say: 'It's not even, say, half of Denmark's annual emissions.' It's small,'” he said.

“But if what the 1 percent (or the very small fraction of people who can travel on private planes) do is not relevant, then obviously nothing is relevant because everyone else will just point at this small group and say, 'Look, “They are polluting much more than me.”

In recent years, private jet owners and passengers have come under increasing scrutiny.

Many countries require planes to publicly broadcast their locations to coordinate air traffic control, which has allowed companies like FlightAware and private citizens to report the location of specific planes and scientists to analyze their emissions.

In 2020, a high school student created an automated account on X, then known as Twitter, that tracked Elon Musk's private jet. He also created accounts for Mark Zuckerberg and Taylor Swift.

The result was an avalanche of social media criticism of the billionaires and memes about their excessive travel. During the 2024 Super Bowl, X users followed the drama as Swift raced from a show in Tokyo to the Las Vegas stadium (after a stop at LAX) with just 14 hours between the two events.

According to the new study, the previous Super Bowl attracted 200 private jets to the Phoenix area. The Cannes film festival attracted almost 650 people and the FIFA World Cup attracted more than 1,800.

It was also not unusual for planes to travel to multiple events. Two Super Bowl attendees also attended COP28, and 61 climate conference planes also traveled to Cannes.

The greater attention and visibility of private planes has caused negative reactions among their passengers.

Both Musk and Swift's teams threatened legal action against plane tracker creator Jack Sweeney for violating their privacy.

Privacy pressure led the FAA to introduce a new feature allowing US-registered aircraft to hide their identity in 2019.

The measure, if adopted en masse by private planes, could prevent scientists like Gössling from determining what plane model it is, which researchers need to calculate carbon dioxide emissions.

In April, the study's authors say, 283 planes were hiding their identity, representing about 1% of the private jet fleet.

But Sweeney, who has linked certain planes to celebrities by evaluating aircraft paint jobs, aligning flight paths with public schedules and finding loopholes in FAA privacy measures, is undeterred. “Simply put, it won't… stop tracking,” he wrote on X.