Wizz Air, Europe’s greenest airline and the largest low-cost carrier in Central and Eastern Europe, calls out legacy airlines to stop flying empty seats on business class on flights under five hours.
Business class should be banned on every short haul flight. These business class passengers account for twice the carbon footprint of an economy class passenger, and the industry is guilty of preserving an inefficient and archaic model. A rethink is long overdue. Wizz Air calls on fellow airlines to commit to a total ban on business class travel for any flight of at least less than five hours. The age of old school travel is over, just like business class.
Aircraft fleet with a smaller environmental footprint
Wizz Air currently operates at the lowest CO2 emissions per passenger amongst all competitor airlines, equalling 56.8gr/passenger/km in October 2019. WIZZ’s ultra low-cost business model relies on a high load-factor (95% in H12020) and a dense cabin layout in order to make flying sustainable and CO2 emissions per passenger as low as possible. Wizz Air has committed to further reducing its emissions by 30% for every passenger in the next 10 years and calls on other airlines to do the same. This is an industry problem and needs industry-wide solutions. The industry as a whole needs to be more aggressive in its ambitions in order to truly make a difference.
Wizz Air is committed to developing its fleet with the state-of-the-art Airbus neo aircraft family and has a firm order of 268 of the world’s most efficient single aisle aircraft. The unbeatable fuel efficiency and the great aerodynamics of the of WIZZ’s newest aircraft, the dozen of implemented operational efficiency initiatives, the lightest materials used in the cabin and a network design which avoids unnecessary connecting flights make our operations truly sustainable. The airline’s current fleet has an average age of 4.5 years, thus being one of the youngest airline fleets in the world. As a result, it is the airline with the smallest environmental footprint in Europe per passenger kilometre.
Wizz Air recently released a call for action video, that can be found here:
József Váradi, CEO of Wizz Air Holding said: “Wizz Air is devoted to sustainable aviation and we call out all fellow legacy airlines to conduct their business in a responsible way and stop flying empty seats on short haul. The industry as a whole needs to be more aggressive and ban business class on short haul flights. We at the same time call for all travellers to make a well-informed choice when booking a flight. The age of old school travel is over, just like business class.”
