How much contaminates a plane

Airplanes, increasingly used, produce Greenhouse gasesmostly carbon dioxidecontributing to global warming. Air transport issues approximately 2% of global carbon emissions. In order to count the CO2 emissions, they are calculated taking into account the number of passengers, the type of plane, the number of take -off and landing cycles, the distance, among other factors. That is why saying how much contaminates a plane is relative, since it depends on many factors and its carbon footprint can vary. For example, it does not contaminate the same a plane full of passengers that runs through a distance from London to Paris, that private jets, since private planes distribute their emissions among less number of people.

Below is an example of the emissions of an airplane that runs through the round trip between New York and Madrid: with an average of 150 and 300 passengers, they emit between 900 and 1350 tons of carbon dioxide.

The effects of the pollution of airplanes harm different qualities of the environment at the local level, that is, especially in the areas where airports are located. These effects are divided into three categories:

• Noise pollution: The noise caused by all the movements of the airplanes, by the engines and the aerodynamic noise. Know more about what acoustic pollution is and how it affects us with this other article.
• Air pollution: Aviation CO2 emissions, as well as other harmful substances that are released the airplanes deteriorate air quality in the airport territory. In this other post we talk more about why the air is contaminated.
• Landscape impact: Airplanes also have a landscape impact due to the modification of the environment, required to be able to carry out all those airport operations. Both orography and biotope are modified, since species that are not compatible with aerial activity are eliminated. Here you can read more about visual pollution, its causes, consequences and solutions.

On the other hand, global aircraft also have the following impacts:

• For their manufacture as much as to put them into operation, they are extracted Non -renewable raw materials Like oil, especially for the kerosene that aircraft uses, and also metals such as titanium.
• Infrastructure used for air transport, in addition, they have impacts such as Ecosystems degradationsoil contamination and water table due to the spills that are emitted by the activities in the airports, contamination or diversion of natural drainage, interference with the routes of migratory birds and global landscape impact.
• Contribution to global warming by greenhouse gas emissions.

An Airbus A380 air plane with a fuel capacity of 323,546 liters, and with a large capacity for passengers, needs to use the energy equivalent to the fuel that is used approximately 3,500 cars, so A plane is more pollutant than a car.

Although, what is true, is that the contamination of a car also depends on different factors, such as the type of fuel, the engine, the distance traveled, among others, and according to these what comes to contaminate a car I could vary greatly.

Taking into account that a train has CO2 emissions of 14 gr per person and kilometer traveled, a 285 gr plane and one ship a thousand times more than the train, speaking at CO2 level, The ship is more polluting than the plane. In addition, the ship is also more polluting than a plane due to the production of wastewater it has.

According to the World Tourism Organization and the United Nations Program, the most polluting and harmful transport for the environment are The cruisessince a cruise with capacity for 3,000 people produces up to 210,000 liters of wastewater a week and emits 1,000 times more carbon dioxide than a train trip that, as we have said before, emits 14 gr of CO2 by people and km route.

In conclusion, tourism either by boat or by plane has a great environmental impact, so the most advisable to travel is to use the train or bus, which emit less CO2 emissions per passenger and kilometer traveled.

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