- What up world?

Myles Bess here.

Journalists, host, and someone who likes long walks on the beach.

And by that I mean short walks to my couch.

Private jets, the ultimate status symbol.

It feels like every music video has them, and DJs use them as their personal taxis.

But, and this is a big but, and I cannot lie, sorry I had to, but private jets are not great when it comes to climate change.

And that's because they are literally the least fuel-efficient way to travel.

A private jet can emit two metric tons of CO2 in just one hour.

For comparison, the average car emits about 4.6 metric tons in an entire year.

In other words, private jets are the new blood diamonds.

You've got climate activists protesting them, and France is even considering banning them.

Sacre jet bleu!

So today we're asking, should private jets be banned?

(record scratching) All the cool kids are flying private.

Get this, in 2021, there were over 3.3 million private flights, the most ever, which is a 7% increase from 2019, which held the previous record.

And private jet sales, especially among first-time buyers, are skyrocketing.

See what I did there?

But it's not just celebrities who are flying private.

You've also got business execs flying around on corporate jets.

You don't even have to own one to fly private.

You can just charter a plane.

There's even membership services to fleets of private jets.

It's like the Costco of the sky.

And I'm gonna be honest with y'all, selfishly, if Steph Curry invited me on his private jet, I would not hesitate to say yes.

I'd order sea bass and caviar too.

When it comes to climate change, we've talked a lot about it.

You can watch some of our videos here, here, here, here, here.

And CO2 is one of the biggest contributors to climate change.

So how much CO2 do private jets actually emit?

It turns out data on private fuel emissions is hard to come by.

There's no like annual report that measures that, and it's really hard to separate out private jet emissions from general commercial flying per se.

More on that later.

If you look at flying as a whole, which includes private, commercial and freight flights, all of that activity accounts for about 2.5% of all of the world's CO2 emissions per year.

Okay.

Now if you're like me, you might be thinking, great news 2.5, that's nothing.

And that includes all kinds of flying, not just private, bruh, I'm gonna fly private.

Yo Steph, hit me up for that invite.

But, before you bust out that caviar, that's not the whole story.

Let's put these carbon emissions in perspective.

Scientists agree that to prevent some of the worst effects of climate change, we have to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius or 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit.

And this means drastically reducing our greenhouse gas emissions.

I'm talking a 45% reduction by 2030, and net zero by 2050.

That means getting emissions as close to zero as possible, and then having nature absorb what we do emit.

On an individual level, this means each of us has to limit CO2 emissions to a grand total of 2.3 tons per year by 2030.

And you know what's not great at reducing carbon emissions?

You guessed it.

My uncle.

(man farting) And private jets.

Like I said before, a private jet can emit two metric tons of CO2 in just one hour.

With one trip, you've basically used your theoretical allotment of CO2 emissions for the entire year.

The entire year.

Take Drake's private jet.

This bad boy's estimated to have emitted about 2,900 tons of CO2 in the first half of 2022.

My real name's Aubrey.

Okay.

And as private jet use continues to rise, CO2 emissions from them start to add up.

Using data from 2016, one report separates out and estimates that private jets emitted about 33.7 million tons of CO2, and private jet use has increased a lot since then.

For comparison, Denmark emitted 27 million tons of CO2 in 2020, and they have a population of over five and a half million people.

What that means is... We are doomed!

And when you compare flying commercial with flying private, one analysis by a European environmental campaign group found that private jets are five to 14 times more polluting then commercial airlines on a per passenger basis.

The report also found that within Europe, compared to commercial flights, private jets are twice as likely to be used for very short trips.

We're talking less than 500 kilometers or 310 miles.

That's like the flight from SF to LA, which is about 337 miles, a.k.a.

the same distance my parents had to walk uphill, in the snow, barefoot to get to school every day.

But planes are the least fuel-efficient on these short trips because taking off and landing requires a lot of fuel compared to cruising altitudes.

So what can we do about all this polluting from private jets?

Well, like I said before, a call at a straight-up ban them is getting some momentum in countries in Europe.

And flight bans aren't totally unheard of.

I mean, France has recently banned some short-distance flights.

If there's trains available, the planes won't fly.

But like can you imagine if the entire globe was just like, no, all private flights are grounded.

Sorry, Bezos.

Sorry, Elon.

You'd have to fly commercial.

What would they do?

Probably take a rocket instead.

Others are suggesting we tax private aviation up the wazoo and have those taxes go towards researching and developing environmentally-friendly jet technologies.

After all, the ones spending the green to fly in them should be the ones making them greener.

And some experts in Europe are even recommending that, by 2030, only private jets powered by green hydrogen and electricity be allowed to fly for trips under 1,000 kilometers or 621 miles.

And part of the reason people hate on private jets is because there's such a disproportionate amount of CO2 coming from a very small group of people who can afford this luxury.

And while the wealthier gallivant on their private jets, global CO2 emissions continue to rise, with 2021 setting a record amount of about 37 billion tons.

And we're seeing some of the impacts of that now.

And it's the non-rich who are the most vulnerable with having to deal with more severe droughts, heat waves, water scarcity, wildfires, floods, melting of polar ice and sea level rise.

And I'm not just talking about poor countries, but also poor communities right here in the US.

Now, some might say flying private is the good old free market capitalism at its best.

Let the people fly the way they want, and the government shouldn't get involved.

And look, I mean, I get it.

Private jets are super convenient.

You can avoid TSA lines, germs from other passengers, there's more privacy.

But if "The Lorax" has taught us anything, it's that that laissez-fair attitude... Laissez-fair, a policy or attitude of letting things take their own course, without interfering.

Laissez-fair attitude isn't great for the environment.

So, while the governments of the world grapple with how to best handle this impending climate doom, I'm curious, what do you think?

Think anything should be done about private jets?

As always, I'm your host Myles Bess Peace out.