Principles and Methods
Since 2006, ETH Zurich has been monitoring the greenhouse gas emissions from air travel by its employees, students and guests.
As the basis for the Air Travel Project, a Downloadframework concept (PDF, 286 KB)vertical_align_bottom was developed in 2016 by the company EcoExistence, which provided the ideas for the target definitions and the compilation of reduction pathways. It also laid the foundation for the development of the participatory process between the departments. In parallel, Downloaddefinitions (PDF, 177 KB)vertical_align_bottom around the reduction of air travel emissions at ETH were developed by the former ETH Zurich Mobility Platform.
For the years 2006 to 2016, the company EarthEffect was assigned to calculate the emissions from business travel (air travel, car travel, train travel) at ETH Zurich based on the existing travel costs. All business trips of ETH members and guests for which the travel costs were covered by ETH Zurich were recorded. At this time, student travel was not yet included. This Downloadmethod description (PDF, 192 KB)vertical_align_bottom and this Downloadsummary (PDF, 128 KB)vertical_align_bottom by EarthEffect on greenhouse gas emissions from business travel at ETH Zurich provide more detailed information.
For the years 2016 to 2018, the company Infras took over the calculation of emissions from business trips at ETH Zurich. Infras applied the same method as EarthEffect but with a small correction, which is described in this Downloadsummary (PDF, 293 KB)vertical_align_bottom. Infras wrote two further documents describing the procedure and methods used to record greenhouse gas emissions from flights and the consideration of non-CO2 climate contributions from air travel at ETH Zurich.
At the same time, the company external pageatmosfaircall_made was commissioned to calculate the emissions with the standard VDR methodology used today, based on the actual flight information such as flight number, flight date, type of aircraft, etc. The atmosfair method is considered the most accurate of the three methods and is therefore used exclusively for the calculation of ETH flight emissions since 2016. Further information on the calculation of emissions by atmosfair can be found on the page Emissions Calculation by atmosfair in the Data Stewardship section.
To make the data comparable and consistent, the EarthEffect and Infras data from 2006 to 2016 were corrected retroactively and aligned with the atmosfair data. At the same time, estimates were made for student flights so they could also be retroactively amended for the same time period. This Downloadreport (PDF, 728 KB)vertical_align_bottom from 2021 by external pageIselin Medhaugcall_made explains the alignment procedure (Fig. 1). Based on the atmosfair data from 2016 to 2019, Iselin Medhaug wrote another Downloadreport (PDF, 3.5 MB)vertical_align_bottom that provides a detailed analysis of the flight behavior and emission trends at the ETH department level.
Additional documents
EcoExistence:
EarthEffect:
- DownloadTreibhausgas-Emissionen aus Dienstreisen der ETH Zürich - Methodenbeschreibung 2016 (PDF, 192 KB)vertical_align_bottom (in German)
- DownloadTreibhausgas-Emissionen aus Dienstreisen der ETH Zürich - Zusammenfassung 2016 (PDF, 128 KB)vertical_align_bottom (in German)
Infras:
- DownloadTreibhausgasemissionen aus Dienstreisen der ETH Zürich 2017 und 2018 - Kurzfassung (PDF, 293 KB)vertical_align_bottom (in German)
- DownloadTreibhausgasemissionen aus Dienstreisen der ETH Zürich 2019 - Zusammenfassung (PDF, 247 KB)vertical_align_bottom (in German)
- DownloadProcedure and methods for the assessment of greenhouse gas emissions of flights at ETH Zurich - Short report (PDF, 615 KB)vertical_align_bottom
- DownloadHow to include non-?CO? climate change contributions of air travel at ETH Zurich (PDF, 217 KB)vertical_align_bottom
Iselin Medhaug:
- DownloadThe ETH Zurich flight emission project: Emissions 2016-2019 (PDF, 3.5 MB)vertical_align_bottom
- DownloadAligning old and new ETH Zurich flight emission estimates: 2006-2019 (PDF, 728 KB)vertical_align_bottom