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Comment by Ekaros | Hacker News Reader

Why not just set some quota per year. Like 8 flights per person?

That's an interesting idea. Let people who don't fly sell their quota to people who do fly.

That's how it should be done IMO. But the quota should be directly on the thing you want to cap, which are emissions and not flying per se.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emissions_trading

Maybe there should be also some sort of exponential component. So more quota you buy more you have to pay extra tax on it...

There is a benefit to keeping the rules as simple as possible. Capping the number of flights is simpler to understand. Most of the problems with flying are fairly well correlated with number of flights.

Trying to directly cap emissions seems like a good way to make the program fail before it even starts. Do you penalize fliers who end up on an older, less efficient jet? Takeoffs burn a lot of fuel so do you penalize fliers who take flights with a layover? If a plane flies half-full, do the passengers pay more?

That's not how it would work. If an airline company plans to emit X amount of CO2, they need to buy the right to do so. The cost would only be indirectly paid by consumers through the cost of their ticket. You can think of it like a currency that polluters need to spend (or more accurately, eliminate, since there is no recipient) when they pollute.

Capping and trading is the more simple solution. Instead of putting various restrictions and limits on a ad hoc basis (often influenced by lobbyists and special interest groups) for dozens and dozens of activities, you have just one unified system.

I like the idea that I, as a consumer, have a quota that I can sell. Burying it in the price of the ticket hides it too much IMHO.

I also think it would be an easier thing to sell politically. Most people don't fly every year and giving them an easy way to turn their lack of travel into a small bonus is appealing.

A cap-and-trade program has the double whammy of being a tax / regulation and pro-environment. Two things the right and much of the center are going to say "no" to.

I saw once the proposal that revenues from a carbon tax should be redistributed equally.

It seems like a practical implementation of a bonus-malus system.

I like that idea a lot.

Inevitably a later regulation will allow the quotas to be sold as a kind of coupons.

Some people, like Jancovici, suggested 4 flights in a lifetime per person.

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