COLOGNE, January 25, 2024 — As of 2025, when booking flights online, passengers will be able to see standardised information on the “carbon footprint” and “carbon efficiency” of flights in the European Union, along with an explanation of the result. This will be achieved via the Environmental Labelling Scheme, an initiative led by the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), which aims to provide passengers with trustworthy and harmonised environmental information about their flights.
For airlines, the Environmental Labelling Scheme promotes a fair competition framework that recognises sustainability efforts, which will bring transparency and therefore competitiveness to the market.
“The labelling scheme will allow passengers to make sustainable choices when booking their flights, based on trusted information coming from an expert, but neutral, agency,” said Maria Rueda, Director of Strategy and Safety Management at EASA. “It will make progress towards decarbonisation of aviation visible and allow passengers to be part of the solution – by ensuring they can be actively aware of the impact of their travel choices.”
To calculate the carbon footprint and carbon efficiency, EASA will look at actual historical data provided by airlines and project the carbon footprint per passenger and carbon efficiency for future flights. Using real operational data guarantees greater accuracy and reliability for the calculation.
Taking part in the Environmental Labelling Scheme will be voluntary for airlines. Airlines that choose to opt in will be required to submit flight data for all flights that fall under the scope of the initiative to EASA. They cannot choose to submit data only for certain routes. A further requirement for those who have opted in is that they need to display the result in their booking systems and so ensure that this information reaches the passengers. EASA is launching an early adopters’ plan for interested airlines, to provide guidance and allow them to make an initial assessment.
The preparatory phase of the Implementing Regulation on the Environmental Labelling Scheme will take place during 2024. On January 22 and 23, the Agency hosted the first workshop to promote the initiative and bring aviation and travel stakeholders on board. This workshop was co-organised with the European Commission – DG Move and welcomed about 70 representatives from airlines, airline associations and online travel agents, following an open call for registrations. A follow-up session of this workshop will take place on April 9, 2024 in Brussels.
Background
On October 18, 2023, the ReFuelEU Aviation Regulation was signed into law. The initiative was designed, in great part, to promote the use of Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAF) within the aviation sector and gives a new set of tasks to EASA.
The Environmental Labelling Scheme is another piece of the ReFuelEU Aviation Regulation, aiming to provide consumers with clear, accurate and standardised information about the environmental performance of flights.
