FACUA investigates Ryanair's 'greenest airline in EU' claims

Earlier this month, according to British broadsheet The Guardian, the UK had pulled the plug on the advertising claim, dubbing it 'greenwashing'.

Now, the Spanish federation FACUA-Consumers in Action, along with the ministry for consumer affairs – led by United Left leader Alberto Garzón – is also looking into the issue.

Airlines being conscious of, and attempting to reduce, their carbon footprint, are to be encouraged, but the low-cost Irish carrier may be forced to change its wording if it turns out that it cannot substantiate its claims to be the 'greenest on the continent'.

On Ryanair's corporate website, a monthly CO2 report is provided, and the headline states that it was the first EU airline to do this.

It says that its carbon dioxide emissions per passenger per kilometre are the lowest in the EU airline industry, based upon its having 'one of the youngest fleets' at an 'average of six years', and the 'highest passenger load factor' at 96%.

“Our CO2 per passenger per kilometre has been cut from 82g to 67g (-18%) over the last decade,” the report reads.

“[This] is substantially lower than [Ryanair's] EU competitors.”

The company aims to cut its CO2 output to under 60g per passenger per kilometre within the next 10 years.

In the last nine months, according to Ryanair's monthly CO2 reports, emissions have actually risen slightly, from 66g per passenger per kilometre in May and June of 2019, to 67g from July to November 2019 inclusive, and now 69g in December 2019 and January 2020.

But FACUA argues that the metrics supplied are over a year old – from January 2019.

These state a total number of kilometres flown of 13.475 billion, total passengers 10.8 million, total CO2 emissions at 935 kilo-tonnes, and 69g of CO2 per passenger per kilometre.

FACUA has started its own research, beginning with requesting CO2 emissions data from the Spanish Air Security Agency (AESA) for each airline operating in the EU.

The organisation says Ryanair's data do indeed show that its emissions were lower than the other airlines it mentions on its site – indicating that it is certainly making sterling efforts and heading in the right direction in this sense – but that the airlines it compared itself with are 'a very limited number'.

They include easyJet, AF-KLM, Lufthansa, and the Anglo-Spanish group IAG, which owns British Airways and Iberia.

And FACUA says data for these and other airlines from 2019 are omitted, meaning the claims 'may not be based upon reality'.

Also, according to The Guardian, an EU report named Ryanair as one of 'Europe's top 10 carbon emitters' at the beginning of 2019.

Britain's Advertising Standards Authority said one of the CO2 charts Ryanair used to substantiate its claims was dated 2011, which was 'of little value', and that 'some well-known airlines did not appear on the chart, so it was not clear whether they had been measured'.

Seating density, or number of seats per plane, is also 'significant information' when calculating emissions, the ASA stated.

Ryanair started reporting on its emissions after being named 'the new coal' at the beginning of 2019 by the European Federation for Transport and the Environment, when its 2018 figures showed its CO2 output had risen by 6.9% in a year and 49% in the previous five.

The carrier's renewed efforts to slash its carbon footprint came in response to finding out that it was the only firm in the top 10 highest emitters in Europe that was not a coal company.

All these conflicting data show Ryanair could either be the EU's greenest, or the EU's most-polluting, airline, and is not helpful to travellers whose choice of long-distance transport is at least partly influenced by the impact of this on the planet.

FACUA's research will be eagerly awaited by frequent fliers.