by Mia Taylor
Last updated: 2:34 PM ET, Tue August 20, 2019
Lufthansa is making it even easier for globetrotters to offset the climate impact of their travels.
The German airline has just announced via a statement on its website that it is launching a groundbreaking new sustainability platform known as "Compensaid" that will be focused on allowing customers to purchase CO2 neutral aviation fuels. Travelers can use the platform to replace the fossil fuel of their flights with Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF).
"CO2 neutral, synthetic fuel is one of the most promising alternatives for making the future of aviation climate-neutral," Lufthansa said in a statement. "Industry and nationwide deployment has failed so far due to limited quantity and high cost. With the launch of "Compensaid," the new sustainability platform, the Lufthansa Innovation Hub and the Lufthansa Group are now making it possible for travelers to offset their individual carbon footprint using so-called Sustainable Aviation Fuel."
Using the platform, airline passengers can reduce as much of 80 percent of the CO2 emissions of their travels.
Travelers have two options for offsetting. For the first time, they can replace fossil aviation fuels one-to-one with SAF. The platform calculates the market-based surcharge in comparison to fossil kerosene. Travelers willing to pay this surcharge can use it to cover their individual kerosene consumption with the climate-neutral fuel. The Lufthansa Group will continue to pay the basic rate for the kerosene.
The SAF purchased as part of the offsetting process will be deployed on Lufthansa flights within a period of six months.
"This is the first online platform of its kind to provide end customers with a transparent, quick, and effective way to offset their CO2 consumption when flying using CO2 neutral fuels," the airline said.
Alternatively, and also exciting, travelers can use "Compensaid" to support a reforestation project in Nicaragua and thus reduce C02 emissions over the long term.
Compensaid also helpfully provides a transparent overview of a persons' entire travel history and associated emissions across all airlines.
The site uses an innovative tracking tool for a user's flights worldwide to do this. Travelers then receive a detailed evaluation of their individual travel history, which not only includes flight distance, time and destinations, but also shows the efficiency of the respective aircraft type, individual fuel consumption, and the associated CO2 emissions.
"Flying benefits our world in many different ways - it connects people, helps bridge cultural divides, intensifies business relations, and enables interactions to take place across long distances. But flying also has negative climate effects, which need to be counteracted...Every individual traveler can take action," Gleb Tritus, managing director Lufthansa Innovation Hub, said in a statement.
Let's all say it together: Thank you Lufthansa. Yet another reason to fly this innovative airline.
The significant environmental impact of carbon emissions tied to flying have come under increasing scrutiny of late. Thanks to the efforts of high-profile figures like Greta Thunberg and filmmaker-naturalist David Attenborough, an increasing number of flyers are becoming pollution conscious and are acting on their concerns by purchasing carbon offsets to mitigate the impacts of flying.
In addition, the tour company Responsible Travel recently released a manifesto on aviation and climate change that calls the aviation industry one of the fastest-growing contributors to greenhouse gas emissions.
The manifesto from the travel company challenges governments around the world to take actions to reduce demand for flying through taxation and other measures.
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