Dreams of Green Travel

I dream and hope that some day truly green travel will be possible. Travel is a wonderful thing, but not when it trashes the earth.

I used to work for ocean explorer Captain Jacques Cousteau and even back in the 1970s he knew that we had to invent new ways of getting around that didn't destroy the remaining beauty and health of the planet. One of his ideas was that high-tech, wind-propelled sailing ships would be smart alternatives to our highly polluting, climate-destroying modes of transport.

Did we listen? Of course not. Our fossil-fueled ships, cars and planes have continued to pump toxic emissions into our atmosphere and the oceans. Almost 40 years later, in spite of more fuel-efficient vehicles, we're reaping the true environmental costs of not heeding the warnings of our early green pioneers. Air travel and other vehicle emissions, including huge tankers bringing "stuff" from Asia for our local Walmarts, are a core cause of escalating global warming, ocean degradation, species extinction and human and animal disease.

Is it time at last for us to take a look at 21st century travel with an awareness of the true environmental and social costs of unlimited travel by the wealthy peoples of the world?

Travel is a wonderful thing. It expands our minds and provides precious, enlightening experiences. It is also a luxury available mostly to First Worlders who remain oblivious to the true environmental, social and even political costs of their peregrinations and pilgrimages.

When I first raised this issue in environmental circles a few years ago, I thought my green friends would immediately understand the damage done even by well-meaning leisure travel to vacation spots and conferences. I was surprised when some of the most liberal and progressive people I know responded with anger at the mere suggestion that their beloved and privileged travel jaunts might actually be causing harm. As a therapist, I knew this response: it happens when someone stands between an addict and her bottle!

I too love the freedom to travel and hate to think about who or what I'm harming with a simple flight to visit relatives. I try to put that out of my mind, but the more I'm learning about the consequences of climate disruption, the more I have to face the fact that others pay the price of my ticket.

Is "eco-travel" the answer? Certainly it's a good idea (as long as it's not just greenwashing), but we still have to fly and drive to that nice green hotel in Costa Rica. No, I think we need a bottom-up redesign of travel, considering ALL the impacts.

I'd love to hear of any creative solutions HuffPo readers may know about.

 

 

 

Comments

[Barbara Wishingrad]

01:31 AM on 08/03/2010

Have you seen the video on the solar airplane? Solar Impulse, around the world in a solar airplane. http://www.solarimpulse.com/ I saw it on youtube but can't seem to find the link right now.

[shields3033]

12:59 AM on 07/29/2010

Concerned travelers might be interested in reading the book "Grounded", by Seth Stevenson, an account of a round-the-world trip he and his girlfriend made without flying. Of course, they still had to make use of either a freighter or in one desperate instance, a cruise ship, but he did succeed in his goal by using ships, trains, ferries, buses, bikes, and walking. However, this book does not help with practical details on how to accomplish this. You are on your own to figure that out.

[Linda Buzzell]

04:26 PM on 07/29/2010

Thanks, I'll have to check out that book. And maybe someone knows of a source that lists the relative environmental costs of various methods of travelling?

I forgot to mention that a number of prominent figures in the environmental movement have now taken a stand on air travel. For example, I believe that Rob Hopkins, founder of the Transition Movement (his book "The Transition Handbook" has sparked a revolution in towns around the world), no longer travels to conferences to speak, but requests he be wired in via video.

[RMankovitz]

11:51 PM on 07/28/2010

Another great article on an important issue, Linda.

[Marc Ginsburg]

01:47 PM on 07/29/2010

I dream of green travel every day. To be able to afford a bike, like my sister (one of your other second cousins) and her husband who bike up and down the Delaware (how rapturous that sounds). To have a fully clean energy powered vehicle. Did you know that I just heard that hydrogen is the most prevalent element in the universe? I guess you can guess why it's not being developed as a primary source of energy, along with two other very prevalent sources, the sun and wind. Instead, rapidly disappearing sources that are also destroying our chances of survival are being used. Can you guess why? What's the primary rule of capitalism? Of marketplace economics? I said in my contribution to President Obama's birthday card that since, as I now discovered, he's a Leo, he needs to stand up once and for all to these corporate murderers of human beings in two gulfs and many other places in the world with a lion's roar, second to none.

[lbsaltzman]

08:04 PM on 07/28/2010

Everyone wants to have all the goodies of modern life. The ability to travel the globe in airplanes ranks high on many peoples list of what we take for granted. Airplane travel is playing a significant role in increasing greenhouse gas emissions. As the author of this article suggests, ethical and moral decisions have to come into play on the subject of travel. All of us should consider limiting the amount of air travel in our lives as part of reducing our fossil fuel footprint. Train travel is much more sustainable and if ships used wind and/or biofuel, they could be a very sustainable way to travel as well.

[Linda Buzzell]

04:21 PM on 07/29/2010

Has anyone figured out how to calculate our "Travelprint"?

[CruiseMuse]

04:15 PM on 07/28/2010

I just wrote a post on my blog about how cruise ships can use a kite to harness wind power which will save up to 35% in yearly fuel consumption. Not sure if I can post the link to my blog post here, but you can get to it via my twitter account. The kite is certainly not the end all of the cruise line's environmental impact, but every little bit helps!

Moderator: please feel free to delete this link if not permitted: http://cruisemuse.wordpress.com/2010/07/28/hey-cunard-and-princess-go-fly-a-kite/

[Linda Buzzell]

04:29 PM on 07/28/2010

I'm sure Captain Jacques Cousteau would have been happen to hear about this!

[AJH]

02:53 PM on 07/28/2010

Part of our problem is the time equation. The need to move quickly even for first worlder leisure travel means you need to expend large amounts of energy to counteract the laws of physics. Now looking at old vehicles like perhaps airships may be a more efficient means with sufficient speed today and looking far to the future technology like space elevators if they ever came to being and the lift mechanism was powered by a green energy and distance moved horizontally was done in the vacume of space could reduce the energy load and enable continental transport in an energy efficient manner. Regional Land transport could then conceivably be done by a green energy rail or land transport. However those greenies like really remote and poor places so that kind of technology getting there would be decades or more past first world development and front end energy and other resource load to construct a global system would be massive.

In the real world nations like Russia have already deployed nuclear powered icebreakers for the NE arctic passage for potential trade route clearing. It's not a big jump to think a nation like Russia, China, France or even the US might not one day field a nuclear powered trading fleet which would remove the carbon cost for a nuclear waste and terrorist threat cost.

I kind of think we are awaiting energy breakthroughs however unless you have alot of leisure time and can use the wind.

[Linda Buzzell]

04:33 PM on 07/28/2010

You are so right that we need new options! Green energy should be widely supported, but unfortunately we can't seem to give it the support we still give to old, destructive technologies like oil.

[AJH]

02:31 PM on 07/28/2010

"Air travel and other vehicle emissions, including huge tankers bringing "stuff" from Asia for our local Walmarts, are a core cause of escalating global warming, ocean degradation, species extinction and human and animal disease."

And those are just the direct negatives. The indirect negatives of it's impact on the middle class and economic well being of americans is just as important.

When the wealth of nations was written you didn't have panamax and panamax+ vessels shipping anything even raw materials worldwide. The cost of freight was enough to provide sufficient domestic economic protection and help ensure nations maintained a core production(much more sustainable environmentally without transit) as well as socially stabilizing.

[Linda Buzzell]

04:30 PM on 07/28/2010

Good point, AJH.