Examination of Witnesses (Questions 73-79)
Wednesday 4 June 2003
MR KEITH
MANS, DR
HUGH SOMERVILLE
AND MR
COLIN BEESLEY
Q73 Chairman: Welcome, Mr Mans and
colleagues. I am sorry we are such a long way from each other
in this room. It is because it is being televised. I should tell
you, Mr Mans, you are sitting exactly where the Prime Minister
always sits.
Mr Mans: I think it is best I
do not comment on that, Chairman.
Q74 Chairman: Welcome and welcome
in your case Mr Mans, back to the House of Commons. Is there anything
you would like to add to the memorandum which you kindly sent
us before we begin to examine you?
Mr Mans: I do not think so, but
you might want me to introduce the two people I have brought along.
On my far left is Colin Beesley, who is head of environmental
strategy at Rolls-Royce, and his expertise is in the manufacturing
area. On my near left is Dr Hugh Somerville, who is the former
chair of IATA, the International Airline Transport Association
Environmental Committee. He is also a member of the IPCC for its
1999 report on aviation and he obviously is knowledgeable about
the air transport part of the equation.
Chairman: Yes. I must also apologise
for the fact that we may have to be fairly tight on timing because
we are expecting a vote at some stage. I hope it will not interrupt
our proceedings but we are having three panels of witnesses this
afternoon so it may compress things slightly, so I apologise for
that in advance. However, let us lead off on the questioning.
Mr Ainsworth wants to go first.
Q75 Mr Ainsworth: Thank you, Chairman.
Good afternoon. I want to begin by exploring the scale of the
problem that we are talking about and looking at in the course
of this inquiry. I notice in your submission under point 7, the
fifth bullet point under that, you say that the contribution of
aviation to the UK CO2 inventory is around 0.5%. This figure contradicts
the figure used by the Treasury, which says it is 5 %. Are we
looking at a typo here or are we looking at a fundamentally different
basis of evaluation?
Mr Mans: I think the best thing
I can do is to ask Dr Somerville to answer that because it is
a matter which we have obviously discussed beforehand.
Dr Somerville: Good afternoon.
I think the point there is a distinction between what is UK domestic
and what is total fuel loaded in the UK. The UK domestic emissions
amount to a relatively small sum, that is if you take sectors
in the UK, for example between Aberdeen and London. But if you
then take any sectors London to Paris and any outbound flights
plus the other return flights plus all the fuel loaded in the
UK you will get to the 5% figure or something close to it.
Q76 Mr Ainsworth: Is it reasonable,
in your view, to exclude international flights from calculating
the impact of aviation on the environment here?
Dr Somerville: No, we do not believe
they should be excluded. The question is at the moment domestic
emissions are already allocated to national inventories under
the Kyoto Agreement and globally they account for something like
one-third of the total. The international emissions are not allocated
and it would be reasonable to allocate, possibly, given whatever
the UNFCCC comes up with in terms of allocation—it would
be reasonable to come up with, for example, half of the total
involved in international flights between the UK and other destinations.
Q77 Mr Ainsworth: But you have not
done that in submitting your evidence to us?
Dr Somerville: No, we are merely
making the distinction between the total of 5% and 0.5%. At the
moment only 0.5% is allocated to the UK.
Q78 Mr Ainsworth: Okay. It would
help the Committee to be working from a consistent set of statistics
but this is one of the problems we have got. If we stick with
the Treasury's document there is an estimation that aviation emissions
by 2030 are going to rise by between 67 and 77 million tonnes
of CO2. Is that a figure you recognise?
Dr Somerville: What we recognise—and
nobody can predict the future—is that aviation emissions
will grow. The figure you quoted was how many million tonnes?
Q79 Mr Ainsworth: Between 67 and
77 million tonnes of CO2 by 2030.
Dr Somerville: We believe that
what will in fact happen is that aviation emissions in a healthy,
normal economy will grow at something like 3 to 4 % per year.
What you have to remember is that nobody can predict the future.
For example, in the last year IATA's revenue passenger kilometres
have actually fallen by 18.5%, which would account for several
years of growth within what I am saying. So it is extremely difficult
to predict an accurate total. That figure may or may not turn
out to be true; it is one estimate.
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