Cargo Climate Care


The industry is pulling together in order to improve its environmental credentials. March saw Lufthansa Cargo host its biennial Cargo Care conference, at which some of the most important ‘green’ issues as they relate to the air freight industry were discussed. Mike Bryant reports


Environment-friendly: a way forward? A


t the beginning of March, Lufthansa Cargo hosted the Cargo Climate Care Conference 2011 in its home city of Frankfurt. First held two years


ago, this year the German freight carrier’s biennial Climate Care event considered the subject ‘Energy efficiency in air cargo: reality and vision’. Karl-Heinz Köpfle, board member


operations for the German freight carrier, opened the conference and he noted that, since the 2009 event, Lufthansa Cargo had achieved much in the area of environmental sustainability. The carrier now employs lighter containers, achieves better fuel economies and is undertaking serious testing on biofuels, he observed. Genuine forward


Köpfle: “small steps” need to be taken in the same direction


movement will only be achieved in “small steps”, however, Köpfle added, involving


many different companies and organisations across the international air cargo industry. What is crucial, he said, is that they all move


forward together and in the same direction. Köpfle also called for national and supra-national regulators to do their bit, in particular lending his weight to a Single European Sky that would mean lower CO2 emissions and, because of lower costs, leave more money for investment into alternative fuel technologies.


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ECOLOGY VERSUS ECONOMY Nils Haupt, Lufthansa Cargo’s anchorman for the day, also brought to mind the fact that there is a significant ‘ecology and economy’ balance to be made: any progress on environmental sustainability has to be squared with the economic impact of the investment and additional spending required. In other words, the costs of progress on green issues, such as biofuel, will have to be borne, whether by the carrier, other aspects of the air freight supply chain, or by the customer’. Michael Schneider, assistant director carbon


offset business development at IATA (the International Air Transport Association), noted that the public image of the aviation industry in regards to green issues can at times be compared to that of the cigarette industry – receiving little sympathy for its predicament and being poor at promoting its own benefits. Yet, he remarked, the industry has achieved so


much in such a small time in terms of minimising its emissions, while it continues to offer so much in terms of job provision and economic wealth. He explained that IATA has four strategic


priorities in terms of seeing improved sustainability


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