Greenpeace criticizes private jet hype over Davos

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Business jet taking off from Zurich Airport: Often less than 500 kilometers

Photo: Björn Trotsky / imago images/Björn Trotsky

Shortly before the start of the World Economic Forum in the Swiss Alpine town of Davos, Greenpeace criticized the climate-damaging private flights of many participants as "ignorant and inconsiderate".

Short-haul flights would have to be canceled where reasonable train connections existed, Greenpeace demanded.

The 2023 World Economic Forum begins on Monday.

More than half (53 percent) of the business jets that landed and took off at the airports in the immediate vicinity of Davos during the week of the World Economic Forum 2022 had traveled short distances of less than 750 kilometers, it said.

38 percent of the flights involved distances of less than 500 kilometers.

This is shown by an analysis by the Dutch consulting institute CE Delft commissioned by Greenpeace.

The environmental organization accused the Davos participants of publicly campaigning for climate protection but not acting accordingly privately.

In addition to Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD), hundreds of other top decision-makers and prominent figures from politics, business and society are traveling to the Swiss ski resort to discuss the state of the world.

The climate-damaging consequences of private flights have recently been increasingly discussed.

According to research by NDR and Süddeutsche Zeitung, more private jets took off from German airports last year than ever before.

Private jet flights now account for about twelve percent of all air traffic in Germany.

mike/epd