Commenting on remarks by Tony Blair that he expected new technology to mitigate aviation's contribution to climate change, Greenpeace campaigner Emily Armistead said:
"Tony Blair is crossing his fingers and hoping someone will invent aeroplanes that don't cause climate change, but that's like holding out for cigarettes that don't cause cancer. Hoping for the best isn't a policy, it's a delusion. The Prime Minister should be halting airport expansion and getting people back onto the railways. He's finally forfeited any claim to be a world leader on climate change."
Tony Blair said in an interview with Sky News, to be broadcast tomorrow:
- "I think that what we need to do is to look at how you make air travel more energy efficient, how you develop the new fuels that will allow us to burn less energy and emit less."
- "How - for example - in the new frames for the aircraft, they are far more energy efficient."
- The Prime Minister rejected the need to set a personal example on greenhouse gases by taking breaks closer to home.
A report last year by Oxford's respected Environmental Change Institute said industry claims that fuel efficiency will increase dramatically 'may be a significant over-estimate of what is possible and may mean an increase in non-CO2 emissions.'
The Tyndall climate research centre calculated that if aviation expands as projected, Britain would have to totally decarbonise the rest of its economy by 2050 to meet its national climate change target.
ENDS
Greenpeace - 0207 865 8255
