ASA Adjudication on easyJet Airline Co Ltd

Ad

A national press ad, for easyJet, was headlined "Care about the environment? We do too!" Text stated "The Government sponsored Stern Review on climate change judged that aviation accounted for 1.6% of global greenhouse gas emissions. That sounds small but we are not complacent."

Issue

Two complainants challenged whether the claim "... aviation accounted for 1.6% of global greenhouse gas emissions" was misleading, because the UK figure (which included international travel) was actually higher and because the 1.6% figure did not take into account the radiative forcing impacts of aviation emissions.

CAP Code (Edition 11)

Response

easyJet said the claim was not misleading, because it was the figure quoted by the UK Government sponsored Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change. They said the Governments figures were global - like the environmental effects of greenhouse gases - and therefore by definition took into account international travel originating from the UK. They said the ad explicitly stated that it was a "global" figure.

easyJet highlighted the sections of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Changes (IPCC) report "Aviation and the Global Atmosphere", which referred to the effects of radiative forcing. They said radiative forcing was a measure of the importance of a potential climate change mechanism and was sometimes used as a short cut to combine the CO2 and non-CO2 effects of anthropogenic emissions. They said, because the figures quoted in the Stern Review were for greenhouse gas emissions and not solely CO2 emissions, the concept of radiative forcing was not really relevant (because non-CO2 green house gases had already been included in the quoted figure). Although they admitted that the IPCC report also referred to the so called multiplier effect of radiative forcing on CO2 emissions of aviation (for example the report stated "Over the period from 1992 to 2050, the overall radiative forcing by aircraft for all scenarios in this report is a factor of 2 to 4 larger than the forcing by aircraft carbon dioxide alone"), easyJet said there was no internationally agreed methodology for quantifying that effect, because it would be partially determined by the future fleet mix. They said the IPCC report stated that "The climate impacts of the gases and particles emitted and formed as a result of aviation are more difficult to quantify than the emissions". They also quoted the Stern Review: "There is no internationally agreed methodology for presenting warming effects of emissions from aviation as CO2 equivalent, so it is excluded from emissions estimates".

Assessment

Not upheld

We noted one complainant had highlighted figures from the UK Greenhouse Gas Inventory (produced by the AEA Energy and Environment under contract to the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs), which quoted the UK aviation emissions of CO2 at 6% if international travel was included. However, we also noted the ad made clear that the 1.6% figure related to "global greenhouse gas" emissions and it also stated the source of that figure. Although we noted the IPCC report highlighted the issue of radiative forcing, we also noted both that report and the Stern Review stated that its impact was uncertain and there was no internationally agreed method to measure it. We considered that easyJet had stated clearly the basis and source of the claim and concluded that it was unlikely to mislead readers.

We investigated the ad under CAP Code clauses 3.1 (Substantiation), 7.1 (Truthfulness) and 49.1 (Environmental claims) but did not find it in breach.

Action

No further action required.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Non-broadcast)