Prince Charles Bashed for Carbon Footprint of ‘Eco-Tour’
Prince Charles has been criticized by Labour MPs for the carbon footprint of his South American tour to promote climate change awareness and a low carbon economy, slated for next month.
The Prince of Wales and a 14-person entourage will embark on a 16,000-mile trip next month, estimated to release 322 tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. On the tour, Charles will focus on the problem of tropical deforestation and enlist the help of the business community to fight climate change and grow a low carbon economy.
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Although Charles has said he would be purchasing carbon offsets for the South American tour, he has not been able to deflect criticism from some Members of Parliament who have lambasted the Prince for the trip’s “hideous cost.”
“At a time when the greed of bankers is causing much adverse comment,” Labour MP Ian Davidson told the UK’s Daily Mail, “I would have thought that Prince Charles would have had more sense than to be so financially and ecologically wasteful.”
As Al Gore can certainly attest, such criticism is nothing new. In fact, it has become a commonplace critique of virtually any public figure who lives a high-carbon, globetrotting lifestyle and also campaigns on behalf of fighting climate change.
Perhaps some credit should be given to Charles for choosing to charter an Airbus A319 rather than a DC-9 for the 16,000 mile trip: the A319 is 27% more fuel efficient than the DC-9.
But I’ll leave that one up to you.
Image: rev0lvin via flickr under a Creative Commons License
