CLIMATE CHANGE: ITS IMPACT ON AVIATION 2

Climate Change: Its Impact on Aviation

Climate is the weather pattern in a particular place for many years. If the weather pattern averages keep changing and shifting over an extended period, this is called climate change. Scientists have proved that the world today is experiencing rapid climate change. Today more than any time in history, global temperatures have been rising at a very high rate, and this has been attributed to human activities, such as the increased use of non-renewable fuels such as coal, gas, and oil. These human events result in increased emissions of greenhouse gases that lead to large-scale changes in global weather patterns. Additional human events such as deforestation of world forests to create land for agriculture and human settlements have also contributed to this phenomenon, and this is why the weather today is much more erratic, making it hard for one to predict the weather.

Background

Today, the world is experiencing frequent droughts, famine, floods, and storms, negatively impacting many industries’ operations. The aviation industry has not been immune to the impacts of climate change. This research will discuss how this phenomenon has negatively impacted the industry. This will be attained by researching the gaps presented in the literature regarding climate change and its impact on the aviation industry. This will be imperative because it will create more awareness on the issue, specifically in the airline industry itself and their stakeholders such as governments and international bodies fighting against climate change.

By understanding the impacts of climate change on their operations, the airline industry players will ensure that they are up to date with the industry’s standards on all metrics related to climate change effects. In addition to this, the results of this report will give insightful recommendations that the industry should implement to help them guard against the emerging risks posed by climate change. This report will also provide a rich source of information that can be relied on by scholars who would like to undertake further research on the topic. By the end of this research, this report will have provided an in-depth wealth of knowledge on the topic and eliminating uncertainties on all the controversial issues surrounding the subject, and, as such, provide the aviation industry with accurate information they can rely on to make logical decisions that can help them in securing their future successes.

Literature Review

Data collected over a long period has indicated that the aviation industry is not immune to the impacts of climate change. Lopez (2016) states that significant expected impacts of climate change on the airline industry come from temperature changes, storm patterns, precipitation (rain and snow), wind patterns, and sea level. In addition, the fact that climate change will lead to an increased rate of increased drought in the future is bound to impact the aviation industry directly. Hu, Hall, Shi, & Lim (2016) postulate that this drought is bound to impact water supply. This can have a damaging impact on aircraft operations. As a result, this will have a direct impact on the aviation industry in several ways. However, the major ones will be reduced aircraft performance, potential damage to aviation infrastructure, changing demand patterns by aviation consumers, decreased capacity of operations, and a high rate of schedule disruption. Chen and Wang (2019) have the same take on the impacts of climate change on the aviation industry. They postulate that during these contemporary times, the impacts of climate change on the industry have been significant, negatively disrupting the industry’s operations. In addition to this, they stated that the aviation industry is susceptible to severe weather events. These severe events disrupt their operations by resulting in flight disruptions and many delays, resulting in the industry incurring huge losses.

Zhou et al. (2018) argue that climate change has been the main reason for the decreased takeoff performance of aircraft. Coffel et al. (2017) go a step further to state that the severe weather conditions the globe is experiencing today have been the primary reason for the increased disruption of flight operations. These disruptions have directly impacted flight routes, airport capacity, and the delays that the industry has been experiencing recently. (Gultepe et al., 2019) states that in the period between 2000 to 2011, the number of aviation accidents had been increasing, and it has already been established that the leading cause of these accidents was the low ceiling and adverse winds.

Over the last decades, the aviation industry has been characterized by stiff competition. This competition has brought about a situation where all industry players operate on razor-thin margins in terms of the profits they realize. Therefore, any disruption to their operations makes it hard for many airlines across the globe to make profits or even break, and this is something that is being experienced more today as a result of climate change. Coffel, Thompson, & Horton (2017) state that today, many airlines are experiencing aviation delays, injuries, and damages, which have always resulted in huge losses that they cannot absorb.

Gultepe et al. (2019) conducted a survey, and it showed that a large majority of European aviation industry respondents (86%) believed that if the industry was to survive, then the industry players need to be proactive and start coming up with strategies that can insulate it from the impacts of climate change. Gultepe et al. (2019) & Hu et al. (2016) state that climate change will not stop anytime soon, and as such, the industry players should start coming up with measures that can aid them in overcoming the turbulent environment that they will continue to face.

The general conclusion in all these research and studies is that climate change has impacted the aviation industry significantly. Coffel et al. (2017) & Hu et al. (2016) identify climate change factors such as changes in temperature, storm patterns, precipitation, wind patterns, and sea level as the main changes exposed and will keep on putting the aviation industry at risk of collapse. The temperature changes have affected aircraft performance, demand patterns, and the aviation infrastructure such as airports. Fluctuations in precipitation patterns around the globe, on the other hand, could result in an increased rate of cancelations and travel delays. The strong winds and storms have been identified as the significant factors of climate change that might make it hard for the industry to continue its operations. The increasing number of storms are a threat to the industry in that they can bring down primary aircraft leading to massive loss of human lives and significant losses being incurred by the industry. Therefore, it is high that the industry players act and develop measures that can mitigate the risks affecting their industry over the last few years.

Results

This research has shown that climate change has had much negative impact on the aviation industry. This industry is characterized by very stiff competition, and as such, they try to charge their customers very competitive prices, which has made the whole industry operate on very tight profit margins. Climate change has impacted the industry has made this situation much worse (Hu, Hall, Shi, & Lim, 2016). Data collected on this research has shown that the increase in temperature storm patterns, precipitation, the sea level, and wind speeds and patterns have been the major factors affecting the aviation industry significantly.

Today than ever before, many flights are delayed or canceled due to factors associated with climate change. When these flights are delayed, the airlines tend to lose money because their airplanes spend more time on the ground than transporting goods or passengers. Data has also shown that the flights canceled due to bad weather conditions have increased over the last couple of years (Gultepe et al. (2019) & Hu et al., 2016). These cancelations make it hard for the airlines to run their operations effectively. These airlines also incur huge losses in compensating their customers for these cancelations, making it hard for them to profit. Other costs associated with climate change include the increased cost of an airplane and other infrastructure maintenance. The changing wind patterns across the globe have increased turbulence, cause disruption, and affect planned flights.

All these factors show that climate change has negatively impacted the aviation industry. If measures are not taken, the industry will continue being impacted, making it hard for many airlines across the globe to survive. The aviation industry in Europe is taking the necessary steps in a bid to save the industry. Today, more than (86%) of the industry players are implementing different strategies to save the industry.

Conclusion

For the aviation industry across the globe to be saved from the impacts of climate change, industry players and governments, and international bodies should start coming up and implementing strategies that can help mitigate the impacts of climate change in the aviation industry. The industry is characterized by stiff competition that has pushed all airlines to charge low prices, making the industry very susceptible to climate change.

Coffel et al. (2017) & Hu et al. (2016) state that the industry will lose money and make it hard for them to survive in the long term. Today, more than thirty airlines have collapsed, and one of the main reasons for this is that the high costs of operations brought about by climate change made it impossible for these airlines to compete. A prime example of a well-known and established airline that collapsed because of the high operation costs and thin profit margins was Wow Air. Wow, Air had been in operation for 77 years, and it was one of the major airlines in Europe. The airline was running transatlantic flights, and it was estimated that during its pea years, it was able to transport five million people across the globe in one year. However, the impacts of climate change forced this airline to collapse as it could not afford the high cost of operating its plane.

This shows that airlines must start coming up with drastic strategic measures to survive this harsh business environment that they are facing. Other industry players such as significant aviation bodies, governments, and airplane manufacturing companies should play a significant role in coming up with measures that can help prevent this industry from collapsing.

Recommendation

The first measure that can help save the aviation industry is to develop laws that can help halting or reverse climate change. The increased pollution of the environment with carbon dioxide and other greenhouse emissions should be regulated by the law to ensure that business organizations across the world adopt safe operating methods that can reduce air pollution (Gultepe et al. (2019) & Hu et al., 2016).

Encourage the use of renewable energy. This will be a significant step as it will help reduce air pollution and reduce climate change. This will then reduce the aviation industry’s negative impact over the last couple of years (Hu, Hall, Shi, & Lim, 2016). For example, the rate of delays and cancelation of flights would reduce, the aviation infrastructure will last longer, and the cost associated with plane repairs would be reduced considerably.

Airlines should also be proactive in their quest to develop measures that can help them overcome the challenges they face due to climate change. To this end, all airlines should start investing heavily in research that can help them know the measures they can implement to save their business operations (Gultepe et al. (2019) & Hu et al., 2016).

Airplane manufacturers worldwide, such as Boeing and Airbus, should also start manufacturing airplanes that can be flown in the most adverse weather conditions. This can be achieved through research and investing in improving the design of their products.

The airline industry should also play a significant role in reducing climate change. Today, data shows that the numbers of flights run into millions, and these aircraft pollute the Air and contribute to climate change (Lopez, 2016). As such, the industry should develop strategies that can help them operate more safely.

References

Chen, Z. & Wang, Y. (2019). Impacts of severe weather events on high-speed rail and aviation

delays. Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment, 69, 168-183. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trd.2019.01.030

Coffel, E. D., Thompson, T. R., & Horton, R. M. (2017). The impacts of rising temperatures on

aircraft takeoff performance. Climatic Change, 144(2), 381-388. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-017-2018-9

Gultepe, I. et al. (2019). A review of high impact weather for aviation meteorology. Pure and

Applied Geophysics, 176 (5), 1869-1921. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00024-019-02168-6 (Links to an external site.)

Hu, X., Hall, J., Shi, P., & Lim, W. (2016). The spatial exposure of the Chinese infrastructure

system to flooding and drought hazards. January 2016. Natural Hazards. 80(2)

DOI:10.1007/s11069-015-2012-3.

Lopez, A. (2016). Vulnerability of airports on climate change: an assessment methodology.

Transportation Research Procedia. 14 (2016 ) 24 – 31.

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