Page 9 - AAA MAY / JULY 2024 Digital Magazine | GBP

a garbage truck full of clothing The issues are two-fold. Air And, as other ground-based
is burned or added to landfill. conditioners use more electricity transportation sectors reduce
6.Textile dyeing is the second than any other appliance in the their CO2 footprint via hydrogen
largest polluter of water home and with electric fans, con- and electric options, aviation’s
globally. sume 10% of global electricity. share of CO2 produced, while
reducing, will be a bigger slice of
7.An estimated 50 billion new Sophie Geoghegan, a cli- the pie which will be a lightning
garments were made in 2000. mate campaigner at the rod for criticism.
Twenty years later and this Environmental Investigation
figure has doubled to 100 Agency, a London-based green The message is clear for the avi-
billion. NGO says that the average unit ation industry. Despite the great
8.The average person today is just one-third as efficient as it work of industry bodies such
buys 60% more clothes than could be. Ms. Geoghegan adds as ICAO, IATA and ATAG its
they did at the turn of the cen- that “the International Energy extraordinary progress over the
tury and yet we keep them for Agency, says that by 2050, fans past 60 years and its massive
roughly half as long. And the and space cooling will consume economic impact is not being
main culprit is fast fashion. as much electricity as all of recognized nor is the industry’s
China and India do today.” exciting blueprint for the future of
And as the earth Net Zero.
warms, we are turning The other issue the article high-
more and more to air lights is that air conditioners leak Worse the anti-avi-
conditioners to seek hydrofluorocarbon refrigerants ation rhetoric
relief and, according to (HFCs), gases with powerful that started as a
planet-warming properties with
an article in euronews. the most commonly used refrig- well-meaning though
com, that is a disaster. erant – R-410A – a whopping ill-informed whimper
2,000 times more potent than
The article warns that the carbon dioxide. Ms Geoghegan in 2007 has turned
number of air conditioners is warns in the article that these into an irrational cre-
projected to triple from 1.6 billion gases are the “elephant in the scendo which is now
in 2022 to 4.8 billion in 2050 and room. It’s terrifying. Given how noisier than a 1960s
experts warn that we urgently many people are buying air con-
need to change course. ditioners, it could be disastrous.” vintage 707.

Clothes piled up in landfill sites in Chile. Photo: Skynews

ASIAN AIRLINES & AEROSPACE MAY - JULY 2024 | 9