I’m a guilty green. I talk the environmental talk, but I don’t walk the walk, because I get on a Ryanair plane as often as I can, and fly instead.

Because of me, a home in Bangladesh or Fiji or Ringsend will be swept away by the rising seas in 2013, just as Greenland thaws for the last time. Someone’s home will be lost, a family will be displaced. I apologise in advance, whoever you are. I can’t help myself.
I get on the plane despite the fact that I know that Michael O’Leary is a card-carrying capitalist pig. In the aftermath of 9/11, he announced to his shareholders that the deal he had done with a very vulnerable Boeing, to expand the fleet, was so much to Ryanair’s advantage that he jubilantly exclaimed “we raped them!” to the delighted crowd.
I get on the plane despite the fact that he has recently reduced the luggage allowance from 20kg to an inconvenient 15kg per bag, meaning every check-in is a nerve-wracking smiling battle of wills with staff.
I get on the plane despite the fact that the message read out by staff as I’m belting up tells me, every time, that “the use of mobile phones are not permitted on board this aircraft”.
I get on the plane despite the fact that a 33ml can of beer onboard is €4.
I get on the plane despite the fact that the website is allowed to get away with charging me a credit card booking fee, even though there isn’t another way of paying for the flight.
I get on the plane despite the fact that Ryanair charges a “Wheelchair Levy” on top of its advertised price, a nauseating two-fingers gesture to a court ruling that forced Ryanair to contribute to the cost of providing free wheelchairs to those who need them in British airports.
Interestingly, just recently, the British Advertising Standards Authority has ruled that the practise of promoting “free” flights has to stop – the price on offer must be the minimum a customer can expect to pay. I hope other authorities follow suit.
Despite all my reservations, Ryanair changed my life, and I have to acknowledge it. Before Ryanair, travel to Italy was impossibly expensive, only chartered holidays were really possible. Visiting my friends in Tuscany was out of the question, as flights to Rome were pegged at the same outrageous price, in hundreds of pounds, by both Aer Lingus and Alitalia. Now I have a choice of at least three airports to get to my beloved Crete Senesi from Dublin.
I’m on my way back to Dublin, having just visited the friends who were kind enough to host me for my sabbatical. I’ve been able to see for myself that my friend, who I’ve written about here before, after surgery for stomach cancer, is eating like a horse, and enduring chemotherapy much better than most. Not out of the woods yet, but the gloom is lifting and the birds are most definitely singing.
Going back has been a salutary reminder of the intentions I had in taking time out in the first place. The grand dream of writing the Great Irish Novel didn’t turn out exactly as I planned, but it was a creative time, and a loving time, and a time surrounded by stunning natural beauty that repeatedly lifted my heart. And I made such good friends there. Whether or not I produced the goods in a concrete sense in that year is immaterial; the fact that I could give myself that time out to work things out and take a few deep breaths and decide to come back to Ireland was hugely important. The fact that Italy still feels more like home more than Dublin is not Dublin’s fault; I’m only beginning to make new friends and start new jobs.
I am writing this on my laptop on the plane, and I notice, reading the (rather good) inflight magazine, that from next July, mobile phones will be able to work on Ryanair planes. I may therefore find myself in geek heaven, being able to upload photographs and blog and send emails live over Europe. (It could be hell, of course, I hope they ban phones in certain areas, so if I want to read in quiet I can.) I may, however, if I am not careful, spend all my spare time on Ryanair planes, hoovering up all the bargain price trips in midweek early morning flights months away from now, calculating that it’s cheaper to spend the money on a return flight out of Dublin, anywhere out of Dublin, rather than actually spend those days living and drinking and dining out in Dublin. As long as I don’t actually buy anything on the planes.
In a way, I’m admitting here that I would be prepared to burn up entire oilfields in the pursuit of my goals and dreams in my lifetime. I am, despite my bleeding heart pinko liberal credentials, as greedy as the next, and guilty of economic rape by proxy. It was all very well when I boycotted Dunnes Stores when the workers were fired for refusing to handle the produce of apartheid South Africa – there were plenty of other places I could shop in. It was no sacrifice, but as a political gesture it made me feel good, it gave me a sense of participating.
Perhaps the issue isn’t about sacrifice, or shouldn’t be. Aviation fuel has to be of a particular kind, it can’t freeze in low temperatures, and bio-fuels at this stage of their development are not suitable for jet engines. Hydrogen would work fairly easily, but is very bulky to store, and would require radical plane redesign. But it requires a lot of energy to produce, and although its by-product is water, no one really knows what effect thousands of jet engines pumping water vapour directly into the upper atmosphere daily would have on our climate. Richard Branson of Virgin has said that he hopes to fuel his planes with bio-fuel in five or six years, but acknowledges that it may take longer. Boeing and other airline manufacturers are mostly concentrating on making planes more fuel-efficient, which is no bad thing, but it’s still not the same as being carbon-neutral each flight. Branson’s talk may just be good PR, for there is no way that Virgin would switch to an expensive bio-fuel alone, leaving the economic advantage to his competitors. However, should the oil supply collapse, which it is perennially threatening to do, then he may steal a march on his competitors by at least having done his homework. But by then it may be too late for the planet. The market on its own is not the wisest guide for industry.
Capitalism is like fire. It needs to be contained for it to be useful and safe; without constraints it can run wild and do a lot of damage, leaving a lot of scorched earth behind it. The container is government – enforcing ethical behaviour, safety regulations, environmental safeguards, and decent staff conditions across the board. Government needs to be strong and decisive to force the airline industry to change to bio-fuel, for it is not going to happen otherwise. No amount of individual sacrifice can make the difference.
Air travel is a wonderful thing. Cheap air travel is even more wonderful. But at the moment, cheap air travel is destructive and damaging to our planet.
I guess, realistically, that what I am going to do is as follows:
1. Agonise publicly. (See above.)
2. Continue flying regardless, and see my friends as often as I can.
3.Vote Green.