Mitigating the impacts of climate change remains one of our greatest environmental challenges as a business. We are dedicated to delivering on our commitments to carbon-neutral growth by continuously improving the sustainability of our flight operations, and continuing to call for a global industry agreement on climate change.
At the core of our Sustainable Development Strategy is our commitment to manage our carbon emissions and contribute to global efforts to reducing aviation's overall impact on the environment and climate change. We acknowledge that projected increases in our emissions cannot be left unchecked and we are firmly committed to reducing these impacts. The industry is directing significant investment towards addressing these key challenges, including new technology, better operating procedures and sustainable biofuels.
Aircraft contribute to climate change through the emission of oxides of nitrogen (NOx), soot, sulphate aerosols and water vapour. These impacts are summarised below.
Emissions of CO2 contribute to atmospheric warming, but uncertainty remains within the scientific community regarding the impact of other GHGs in the upper atmosphere. In 2007, the IPCC estimated these effects to be about two to four times greater than those of aviation's CO2 alone. In light of uncertainty about the cumulative or 'multiplier' impacts of other aviation-related GHGs such as NOx, we continue to focus our efforts on reducing our CO2 emissions while monitoring the latest atmospheric science research findings from globally recognised climate organisations, including governments, NGOs, international academia, and specialist research institutes (e.g. the Goddard Institute of Space Studies (GISS) at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and Institute of Atmospheric Physics at the German Aerospace Centre (DLR)).