A Common Approach to Aviation Emissions Trading

Abstract

With global climate change high on the international political agenda, pressure on the aviation sector is mounting to address its growing share of global CO2 emissions. In this article, emissions trading is considered as a measure to limit aviation’s impact on the global atmosphere, comparing its use with other types of economic measures and outlining emerging regulations within ICAO and in Europe. Concrete proposals under development by the European Commission have raised questions about whether States can integrate international aviation emissions from aircraft operators of other States in their emissions trading scheme without mutual agreement. In the absence of bilateral or multilateral agreements between States to specifically address aviation’s atmospheric impact on a consensual basis, the author seeks to provide answers within the boundaries of the existing legal framework of the 1944 Chicago Convention, the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and its 1997 Kyoto Protocol. Having established that the intended effect and operational implications of emissions trading obligations are of an international, trans-boundary nature and thus potentially affecting the sovereignty of other States, the conclusion is that there are fundamental doubts that international aviation emissions could be included without mutual agreement if these emissions occur or originate outside the territory of parties to the trading scheme.