Do you really need to book that flight?

At the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, observers reflected on the positives of lockdowns and travel restrictions. Scenes of wildlife on deserted streets and clear skies told a story of what life might be like with reduced flights and a lesser human impact on the planet.

There were many conversations about climate change and how increased availability and proficiency at online meetings would change the way workers interacted permanently. Working from home has become the norm, virtual relationship management is now an important skill and international conferences are accessible to more people.

However, as international restrictions lifted and the European summer dawned, travellers once again made a beeline for airports. The aviation sector has struggled to cope with high demand and staff shortages. As memories of climate aspirations faded, there was a scramble to catch up with friends and family on trips that had been postponed, often more than once. Many people took the opportunity to go on holidays and travel like people suffering from a serious dose of cabin fever.

Although initially slower to recover, business travel has followed this trend, with partnerships and networking opportunities receiving an injection of personal connection, that special ingredient that Zoom just can’t quite deliver.

At this stage of economic recovery, it’s difficult to predict whether this volume of travel will become a new normal pattern, or if it is a short-term spike reflective of the need to reset relationships, collect ideas and catch up with events and meetings that have been missed during the pandemic.

What is clear is that if businesses want to take the lead in reducing emissions beyond their electricity consumption, intentional changes must be made to how travel is planned and supported.

How far will we go to reduce emissions?

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have made it clear that incremental changes to reduce emissions are insufficient to limit global warming to 1.5°C. Instead, ‘immediate, deep emissions reductions’ are required across all sectors. And when emissions from aviation account for around 3% of global carbon emissions, not dealing with air travel emissions is increasingly out of step with consumer expectations.

Innovation towards decarbonising the aviation sector is picking up pace. However, solutions that enable guilt-free personal and business flights are still some way off. This is where behaviour change becomes an important part of the mix to reduce aviation emissions.

Australians are increasingly concerned about the impact of climate change and are willing to make changes in their lifestyle, such as recycling more, reducing energy usage and increasing their use of public transport. However, they are less willing to take more costly actions that may result in higher taxes, fuel costs, energy efficiency costs, or changes affecting their standard of living.

Similarly, businesses may be willing to invest more in solar panels, electric vehicles and energy efficiency to reduce carbon emissions. However, reducing business travel—often recognised as a key ingredient for growth—will require more than best intentions to achieve sustainable and productive outcomes.

Supporting changed behaviour

Most business leaders know that simply asking employees to fly less is not always a helpful solution when long-standing reward systems recognise face-to-face interactions, conferences, events and project management. But as progress is made in measuring, reporting and reducing emissions across all areas of business activity, it’s important that policies and processes don’t become obstacles to employees making more conscious choices to reduce emissions.

So how might business leaders support a more sustainable approach to business travel?

1. Review ‘lowest fare’ policy

This can apply to travel accommodation as well as flight itineraries. Often a low emissions flight may be more expensive, but this is not always the case. However, many corporate travel policies default to the lowest fare choices as the basis for decision making. When planning and selecting flight options, carbon emissions should be an important decision-making consideration, alongside price and convenience. Where possible, policies and budgets should support these types of informed decisions.

To aid decision making, some booking tools incorporate emissions calculations based on aircraft type, stopovers and itineraries. However, many do not. You can try flights.google.com to give you a comparison of the lowest emission flights, although this tool has been recently criticised for changing its methodology from carbon dioxide equivalent to carbon dioxide only, which can make a big difference. The ICAO Carbon Emissions Calculator is a way of estimating emissions for a chosen itinerary, designed to assist with carbon offsetting.

2. Review leave policies

Do business leave policies allow flexibility in time spent away from the office for travel? In addition to health and wellbeing considerations, allowing employees flexibility in when and how they travel can be a useful way to incentivise lower emissions choices. For example, some organisations have stopped same day return interstate flights. Instead, longer stays are encouraged so that more connections or business outcomes can be achieved to make the most of the one trip.

Bonus leave, travel leave or remote working policies that enable employees to connect consecutive events in the same or nearby locations not only help to reduce emissions, but also save costs and have multiple health and wellbeing benefits, including minimising time spent in airports.

3. Encourage annual travel planning

At the start of each year, encourage intentional travel planning for the year. Rather than making it an extra layer of compliance or process, engage employees in considering the potential events and projects requiring travel, along with the intended goals and benefits of each trip. As a significant expenditure, travel should be able to demonstrate some level of return on investment.

Other resources to support sustainable travel planning may include decision-making guides and project life cycle recommendations about when it is best to travel in person and when virtual engagement tools are appropriate. For example, planning and scoping projects, establishing relationships, initial training, and closing projects may be significant opportunities for personal connections. However, project check-ins and connections with local contacts may be effectively managed through online resources.

It is important to recognise the role that travel plays in our personal and professional lives, enabling new experiences, learnings and connections with others outside of the regular spheres of day-to-day life. However, the impact of climate change demands that the world takes significant, purposeful actions across all sectors to reduce emissions. Until clean aviation solutions are a viable reality, businesses have a role to play in reducing unnecessary flights and enabling employees to make more informed and sustainable travel choices. Out-dated policies shouldn’t become an unnecessary obstacle to improved decision-making. Now is the time to make sure travel and leave policies reflect post-pandemic needs and provide a sustainable, emissions focused mindset.