Paper Tickets Are Flying Away For Good
by Andrew Posner, Rhode Island, USA on 02.24.08
In just three months, according to the International Air Transport Association, 100% of tickets issued for air travel will be electronic. This is an impressive figure given that four years ago "just 18 percent of airline tickets issued worldwide were e-tickets when the program started. Today that figure is 93 percent." Like anything related to business, the airlines haven't been making the transition out of the goodness of their hearts. No, there's some money to be saved along the way:
Processing a paper ticket costs 10 bucks a pop, according to the association. The cost to process an e-ticket? One dollar.
"The industry will save over $3 billion each year by offering the passengers a better service," Bisignani (CEO of the association) said.
Of course, e-ticketing is also more convenient for passengers, but what we're most excited about is the amount of paper this initiative will save. We don't have any exact figures, but given the volume of global air travel, they must be large. Now if the airlines can just tackle that other source of environmental impact: the CO2 emissions from actually flying the planes. . .
Via: ::Wired Blog
See Also: ::Air Travel and Climate Change: Take the Train, ::Air Travel TreeHugger Style?, ::Box Wings and Backward Fans For Cleaner Skies, ::George Monbiot on Flying, ::E-Paper Surpasses Dead Trees in Life-Cycle Test, ::Xerox's Reusable Paper and ::Virgin Atlantic Testing Bio-Fuel on Jumbo Jet
You'll still need to print out your ticket, as many people will find out:
http://www.smstextnews.com/2008/02/2500_pound_british_airways_e-ticket_absolutely_worthless_in_mumbai_.html
Granted this saves the energy expended in posting your tickets out to you, or the stress of having to pick them up at the airport, but it won't be a massive paper saving.
Tom
Both major carriers in Canada actually allow you to send your eTicket to your cell phone; apparently it includes a barcoded image that can be read directly from the phone using a normal reader.
If this becomes the norm, we could actually eliminate paper from the boarding passes.
Now if only we could minimize the paper waste of the food and beverage service on planes...I don't need a paper napkin when I drink water so maybe they should only hand them out when someone requests one?
I'm just against flying for pleasure. The only time I fly is for work and they pay. The last time was to the diamond mine in the NWT in the Canadian north. So some lady can put it on her finger. Come to think of it thats pretty dump too.
I have never had to print anything! Just show your passport/ID and they look it up for you. Or when using a self check-in machine you swipe the Credit Card you used or your frequent flyer card and it comes up. I don't know where people get the idea that they have to print out an E-ticket, its E for a reason.