Iceland and Georgia - travel advice

Tour specific travel advice to cut carbon emissions – for Iceland, Georgia and British Columbia tours

The Eagles now has a target to emit net zero carbon from its activities within two full seasons, by cutting emissions by swapping from air to train, for example; and by offsetting. At the moment, net annual emissions after offsetting from all our tours are 280 tonnes. (To keep global temperature rise below 2 degrees by 2100, each person should emit on average no more than 1.5 tonnes per year.) If you would like to help reach the club’s target, there are two main things you can do:

1. Offset your travel (by whatever mode) by buying from the Club’s emissions offset scheme at a cost of around £3.50 for an average return flight within Europe and less for other modes.

2. Choose lower emission mode(s) of transport for all or part of your trip. (Taking a direct flight from say Edinburgh to Munich then continuing to Innsbruck by train, instead of taking connecting flights, will still cut emissions. Or travel by train in one direction and plane the other.)

Per passenger, the rough CO2 emissions for a return from London to Geneva are as follows

Direct flight, Economy Class 400kg

Large car, 4 passengers 160kg

Small car, 4 passengers 80kg

Coach 50kg

Train (e.g. Eurostar ) 25kg

(Source of data: here)

For tours on the near continent, as far as Austria and Spain, tour-specific rail, bus, car and carshare travel advice has been prepared for each tour. If you are going on one of those tours, hopefully the advice is helpful to you.

Given the complete impracticality of using surface modes to get to your tour in Canada, Georgia or Iceland, we cannot provide such travel advice for these countries – although if you wish to explore options for an overland odyssey to Georgia, see https://www.seat61.com/Caucasus.htm.

In any event, please give strong consideration to offsetting your plane journey to Canada, Georgia or Iceland via the Club’s emissions offset scheme. It is club policy that all emissions for club expeditions that receive any club grants, all travel should be offset.