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Message: Aviation’s Impact On Global Warming Image from www.air-and-space.com The Globe and Mail had a somewhat laudatory story this weekend on the early days of Porter Airlines based on Toronto's Island Airport. After much hand-wringing on the part of Mayor David Miller - a staunch opponent of the airport - it seems that Porter Airlines is now a fact of life on the waterfront. While the marketplace seems to think that having more convenient access to short-hop flights is a good thing, the downtown airport does not reduce the need for a faster, more environmentally efficient link from downtown to Pearson Airport in Malton. That a so-called "world class" city like Toronto has not figured this out says much about our ability to hold that designation into the 21st Century. Effective cities make this connection from the business district to the major airport with modern solutions. Why can't we? What does it matter? The Oil Drum web site has a sobering story today on the impact of aviation on global warming. Aircraft use about 1,800 million (1,800,000,000) barrels of oil per year moving people around the globe. Aviation is one of the fastest growing industry sectors in the world, growing at 2.4 times the rate of world GDP. The industry consumes over 5 million barrels of oil per day worldwide, almost one tenth of all the oil used for transportation. In the UK, according to the Department for Transport, the UK aviation industry is growing at approximately 5% per year while its fuel consumption is growing at 3% per year. www.corporateknightsforum.com