Ryanair and easyjet hit out at bid to dilute EU green rules

EASYJET, Ryanair and Wizzair have criticised attempts by the airline industry’s main lobby group to protect long-haul carriers from an EU crackdown on contrails.

In a letter to the European Commission, the low-cost carriers have teamed up to attack objections to Brussels’ plan to monitor aircraft vapour trails.

This is in response to claims made by the International Air Transport Association (Iata) last month, which urged the EU to restrict its inquiry into contrails solely to flights within Europe – an airspace dominated by easyjet, Ryanair and Wizzair.

The trio have put aside their rivalry to argue that the exclusion of long-haul flights from Brussels’ study would make a mockery of its attempt to explore the impact of non-carbon aircraft emissions on global warming.

They claim that such a move would exclude long-haul operations accounting for 52pc of the industry’s carbon emissions, effectively sheltering carriers such as British Airways.

The airlines’ letter said: “Research on non-co2 suggests that flights outside the EU create significant contrails and that these could have an important warming effect. There is no technical reason why extra-eu flights should be exempted from reporting their non-co2 emissions.” The debate stems from a separate letter to the European Commission late last month by Iata, which represents carriers such as BA, Air France and Lufthansa.

Willie Walsh, Iata’s director-general, said that monitoring all flights in and out of Europe would pose a huge burden on carriers, as he urged Brussels to limit its plans to flights within the Continent. However, easyjet and its allies argue that the burden should be shared across all short and long-haul carriers, adding that it was “surprising” that Iata was trying to narrow the scope of the EU’S inquiry.

The new EU rules will require airlines to quantify and report non-carbon emissions, including those from contrails, nitrogen oxides and sulphur, for all flights taking off from within the bloc from next January.

Research by some scientists found that contrails may be responsible for two thirds of the industry’s contribution to global warming. Other research, however, suggests under certain conditions contrails can reflect the sun’s heat back into space, cooling the planet.

‘Research on non-c02 suggests that flights outside the EU create significant contrails’