Green Airlines

Below is my comment on "Green Airlines", the article of TIME magazine dated on February 5th, 2007.

What looked shocking in your article is the definitive contrast of two figures as to greenhouse effects by jet, namely the only 1.6% of airline contribution to greenhouse gases on a global scale and the enormous 2,400 kg of carbon per person emitted by a round-trip flight between NY and Tokyo on an individual level.

Awful enough is that the more time and far away we travel by jet, the more carbon is inevitably emitted and there is little alternative of jet transportation with such speed, even though its portion still seems small in the overall greenhouse gases.

In that sense, your title of “Greenhouse Airlines” symbolizes the deadlock of the environmental hazards that our human beings are now facing as a result of more comfort and speed in life. The first and only step for us to overcome it is to know the very fact, anyway.