Staying Grounded for Environmental Justice

Turbulence Ahead: What LAX’s Expansion Means for the City of Los Angeles’ Legacy on Racial Equity & Environmental Justice (SEIU USWW, June 2021)

February is Black History Month, a time to celebrate Black cultural heritage and accomplishments, but also a time to redouble efforts in pursuit of an anti-racist future. The impacts of global heating and environmental degradation—including air pollution, noise pollution, and water pollution from the aviation industry, from refinery to runway, disproportionately impact Black and Brown people. Take LAX, the most polluting US Airport as an example, where half of the least-white census tracts in Los Angeles County are just east of the airport, under the flightpath and ultrafine pollution tied to jet exhaust.

Hop Hopkins, Director of Organizational Transformation at the Sierra Club writes in the article Racism is Killing the Planet:

"You can’t have climate change without sacrifice zones, and you can’t have sacrifice zones without disposable people, and you can't have disposable people without racism."

Together, choosing to fly less or not at all, we are sending a message that radical transformation is needed for environmental justice. American fossil fuel dependency and racism are entrenched in land use and planning, and in our everyday cultural, business and political norms. At Flight Free we are staying grounded in protest of the harm of fossil fuel pollution on frontline communities today, and the climate harm that is our legacy to future generations.

Passenger Emissions on Google Flight Searches

We were momentarily thrilled in 2021 to see that Google Flights started listing passenger emissions with sorting options that allow users to compare carbon emissions when booking their trips- that is until 2022 when the calculation methodology changed, due to industry pressure. At the start, Google Flights included non C02 warming impacts, which contribute 2-3 times the warming effects of C02 alone. Unfortunately, these warming effects are no longer included in the calculations and flights now appear to have much less warming impact than before. See this article, “Google 'airbrushes' out emissions from flying, BBC reveals” to learn more. Thank you to NPR for featuring Flight Free in their 10/06/21 article about Google Flight Searches, stating that some people are now shunning air travel all together, not just shopping for less polluting flights.

Fighting West Coast Airport Expansion at LAX, OAK and SEA-TAC

In 2019 Aviation accounted for 9% of California statewide and 11% of SF Bay Area greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions; 7% of Washington state and 14% of Seattle Metro area GHG emissions, and are on track to increase. People in airport communities face disparities in health outcomes, health risk factors, and resources. Here are three campaigns along the west coast fighting airport expansion and environmental injustice.

Why Frequent Flyer Programs Have To Go

Stay Grounded recently published a sharp expose on Frequent Flyer Programs, a topic at the heart of the Flight Free Campaign. We ask people to pledge Flight Free to reduce emissions, change the fossil fuel norm, and support strong climate policy. Frequent Flyer programs do just the opposite- they increase air travel and global warming emissions, they normalize and reward climate destruction, and are an enormous public subsidy to airlines that no one voted for. Policy to ban frequent flyer programs and/or eliminate the regressive credit card banking mechanism that feeds these airline programs are vital to social justice and fossil fuel de-growth.

Academic Flying Less Petition

Our allies at Flying Less have launched a new travel petition. This petition/pledge has four elements, addressing four types of decision-makers. It includes both institutional and personal actions. They are welcoming support from anybody who self-identifies as “academic,” including faculty, students, and staff in a university or research institution.

https://sites.tufts.edu/flyingless/sample-page/

Individual Action and System Change - Peer Pressure Might Be the Key

Individual action “vs” system change - it is the latter we need, urgently - and we fully believe in individual choices and actions as a given part in that.

Professor Robert Frank’s studies of “behavioral contagion” support this idea.

Report: Carbon Offsets Used By Major Airlines Based on Flawed System

A new report carried out by Unearthed, Greenpeace’s investigative arm and The Guardian “found that although many forest projects were doing valuable conservation work, the credits that they generated by preventing environmental destruction appear to be based on a flawed and much-criticised system, even though these credits were being used to back up claims of “carbon-neutral flying” and net-zero commitments.”

Envisioning Another Future: Stay Grounded Report "Degrowth of Aviation"

Reading the 2019 report from Stay Grounded: “Degrowth of Aviation” we are reminded that envisioning what kind of future we want is a crucial part in any work towards change we are doing.

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Podcast from Flight Free UK: Climate, Social and Racial Justice

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A great conversation between horticulturalist Poppy Okotcha, Black Geographers founder Francisca Rockey and Flight Free UK team members Sunita Soundur and Armelle Ferguson on privilege, climate justice, the conflict between wanting to see your family abroad and the actual worry that your homeland will disappear into the ocean and much much more. A must-listen, if ever there was one.

"Elite Status - Global Inequalities in Flying" - Report from We Are Possible

“When it comes to climate change, air travel is a uniquely damaging behaviour, resulting in more emissions per hour than any other activity bar starting forest fires. This paper shows that it is also uniquely iniquitous. Everybody eats. But only the privileged few fly.”

How Noise Pollution Affects Heart Health

Exposure to loud noise has long been linked with hearing loss. But the ruckus of planes and cars takes a toll beyond the ears. Traffic noise has been flagged as a major physiological stressor, second to air pollution and on roughly equal footing with exposure to second-hand smoke and radon.

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Hothouse Solutions: "Travel Will Never Be the Same Again"

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“Will travel ever go back to normal? Perhaps it shouldn’t” writes travel journalist Rosie Spinks for this article in Hothouse Solutions. It’s well worth a read - and features an interview of Flight Free USA co-founder, Ariella Granett. Please let us know what you think!

A People-Powered Campaign

The Flight Free campaign is a people-powered campaign. By sharing our stories we inspire change in each other, and when many people join together important shifts become possible. Join our campaign today, and let the world know why you choose to stay on the ground!

Vox Article: "What’s your “fair share” of carbon emissions?"

“Why do we, and our governments, act as if businesses have some sort of “right to wreck” our life support system? Do the wealthy have a right to continue using resources at rates that science says will cause vast future suffering? In effect, this pits existing rights against each other: pursuit of happiness by unlimited consumption interferes with the right to life of others.”