International aviation and maritime transport today result in around 5% of global carbon emissions and this may rise to 10% by 2030. Despite this, the fuels that these two sectors use were excluded from the Kyoto protocol and enjoy substantial tax privileges and exemptions around the world.

Changes to this would have to be global to be effective. Firstly, any unilateral moves by individual countries would have limited effect. Ships and aircraft can refuel, by and large, wherever they want.

Secondly, an uncoordinated approach would pose the threat of tankering, where aviation and shipping companies fill their fuel tanks as full as possible whenever they arrived in territories with lower, or zero duties, thereby increasing emissions.

Finally, the taxation of such fuels is subject to long-standing international agreements like the 1944 Chicago Convention, and taxation of marine fuel is currently banned in Article 14 of the EU's Energy Tax Directive.

The obstacles to removing these global tax exemptions are purely political. We must call on the delegates attending the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow to seek a unified and global approach to ending these tax exemptions and enable these sectors to do their part in meeting global climate change agreements.

#EndTheFreeRide