Green taxes on air travel “a possibility”

The Faroe Islands are one of only 13 European nations that do not charge environmental taxes on aviation. 

Many countries have in recent years introduced these taxes, and this is currently a hot topic in the Danish Parliament.

Denmark’s new transport minister, Benny Engelbrecht, has announced that he is considering introducing green taxes on airfares, despite his Social Democratic Party’s pre-election vows to the contrary.

Green energy by 2030

Faroese environment minister Sirið Stenberg says that although the Faroese government does not currently have any concrete plans of introducing these taxes, she cannot rule out the possibility of doing so in the future.

The Faroese authorities have set a goal of reaching 100-percent sustainable on-land energy use by 2030.

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“This transition will cost a lot of money. We need to look at a variety of ways to finance it, and introducing green taxes on airfares would be one option,” she says.

“With the Faroe Islands being an isolated group of islands, we rely on flying and sailing to reach other parts of the world. We cannot use green transport solutions for this purpose, so we will at some point need to start considering environmental taxes on aviation.”

Translated by prosa.fo