Sustainable travel awareness grows but will action follow?

The business travel community has been building sustainability measures into travel programs at an increasing rate in recent years.

Consumer demand, especially among younger travelers, and heightened awareness about global warming are driving companies to seek more sustainable options.

Yet more needs to be done, and faster, with recent research revealing that 85% of global companies have not set “ambitious targets” on reducing corporate travel-related emissions, according to Transport & Environment.

The Europe-based campaign group launched its Travel Smart Ranking last year to rate more than 300 companies on their “commitment to reduce corporate travel and report air travel emissions” and concluded most companies aren’t doing much on business flying.

But Kit Aspen, founder and director at Thrust Carbon, a green tech startup that calculates emissions and develops carbon offset plans, said sustainability is becoming a “core pillar of travel programs” and that the climate crisis is waking up consumers.

“The most recent [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] report, which reviews 16,000 academic journal articles for and against climate change, said that without a doubt climate change is man-made," he said. "We’re at 1.1 degree [Celsius] global warming, everything gets pretty catastrophic at 1.5 degrees, but that’s the target and we’re on track for well over two degrees so it’s scary.”

The company, which has partnerships with large and small travel management companies as well as directly with corporate customers, has just extended its partnership with CWT and is now providing the travel management company with a carbon calculator for meetings and events.

CWT said sustainability now features in some shape or form on 98% of its request for proposal documents for meetings and events. It has grown in importance over the past few years, said Charlie Sullivan, vice president of product management at CWT.

“It’s painfully apparent right now that we’re in a climate crisis,” he said.

On the business travel side, Sullivan said customers are asking for more robust carbon calculation capabilities than they currently have, while those more advanced in sustainability want information on calculating carbon integrated at the point of sale.

For the meetings and events unit, meanwhile, customer needs range from reports on the carbon footprint after the event to help picking and organizing event locations to minimize carbon footprints.

The meetings and events carbon calculator brings together data on event carbon emissions and waste and highlights areas where a more sustainable option is possible, including destination, transportation, accommodation and food and beverage.

Kevin Harrison, managing director of Good Travel Management, which also works with Thrust Carbon, has also noted greater interest and heightened awareness from businesses and said sustainability is now seen as a “priority.”

He also sees an opportunity for business travel agents to “guide, educate and encourage best practice” on sustainability, though he highlighted the lack of a benchmark to measure against as a challenge.

Mixed methodologies

CWT’s Sullivan said that while he wants to see “robust and unbiased” calculation methodologies based on science, he’s more concerned about consistency across the traveler booking process, from point of sale to the itinerary to the trip reporting element.

“Would it be great if there was one [calculation methodology]?" he asked. "It would make my life simpler, but I’m just happy people are measuring. We’re getting to that calculate-and-reduce element of it.”

And multiple methodologies likely will persist, said Aspen, as legislation from regulators in both Europe and the United States will require companies to have carbon accounting rules in place but have not stipulated a particular methodology.

Thrust Carbon, a PhocusWire Hot 25 Startup in 2022, has recently inked partnerships with other TMCs including TripStax. The TripStax partnership sees a carbon emission calculation applied to trips it books.

Aspen said Thrust Carbon's technology and data are available to TMCs large and small, and deals with booking providers make it easier for smaller companies to act on sustainability. He also said TMCs should sort out carbon reporting as a first step with some mid- and back-office systems already providing emissions data.

Following that, he said providing simple guidance for corporate customers on how to make travel programs more sustainable is another simple step.

Meanwhile, Harrison from Good Travel Management, said initiatives such as carbon budgets within companies and traveler incentives could also help boost sustainability and are likely to be used more widely in the industry.

Carbon offsetting, which is often used as a box-ticking exercise by companies, will not be enough, Harrison said, because it does not address traveler behavior.

“There has to be a combined strategy of traveling as sustainably as possible and working with the right offsetting partners,” he said.