Predict and Decide: The Potential of Economic Policy to Address the Effect of Aviation Trends on Climate Change

This paper argues that reducing the impacts of aviation should be treated as a priority by those interested in averting climate change, and that the scale of reduction needed can only be achieved through demand restraint – i.e. discouraging people from flying. Economic policy potentially has a key role to play in this process. The UK Government has the power to introduce a number of economic measures to complement the EU Emissions Trading Scheme, and these measures probably offer the best hope of starting to restrain demand in the immediate future.