NatureAir - World's First Carbon Neutral Airline

The airline industry isn't exactly known for being the most environmentally friendly method of travel, but with the growing concern towards our impact on this planet, some companies are taking baby steps towards improving their footprints - from a de-icing product made from corn and sugar to American Airlines testing methods to reduce fuel consumption. Nature Air, however, is taking more than just baby steps. Every part of their process is geared towards sustainability.

NatureAir is the world’s first certified carbon neutral airline, and the fastest growing regional airline in Central America. Since its inception in 2000, NatureAir has grown from flying 18,000 passengers annually to more than 140,000 in 2008. Their non-voluntary carbon neutrality program ensures that every flight's carbon emissions are compensated, which guarantees protection and reforestation of the Osa Peninsula in Southern Costa Rica. Its commitment to saving energy extends with the use of bio-diesel (cooking oils), which run its entire ground operations equipment and diesel vans. NatureAir funds 90% of the non-profit educational organization NatureKids, and is a proud sponsor of the Rainforest Alliance, World Heritage Alliance, Climate Neutral Network and Ecotourism Society. The World Travel & Tourism Council, Rainforest Alliance, Conde Nast Traveler and Virgin Holidays have recognized NatureAir for its sustainability and conservation efforts.

NatureAir's Sustainable Tourism Policy

Services

• We have made all of our suppliers aware of this policy and will work with them to develop their own sustainable tourism policy.
• We use local employees for all our positions including operations, maintenance and administration. We provide training to each employee and provide English courses as well.
• We will compensate 100% of our carbon emissions thru flight operations or otherwise (all fuel burned will be compensated for).
• We will make every reasonable effort to become carbon neutral and even carbon positive thru energy conservation, offsets thru conservation and reforestation.
• Aerotica – a NatureAir subsidiary fuel company will work with and support local efforts to fuel our own fleet of vehicles with bio-fuel as well as eventually becoming a fueling station for bio-fuel usage.
• NatureKids Foundation – thru our NatureKids Foundation, www.naturekids.org, we teach local community members English as a way to ensure self-empowerment and better opportunities of employment as tourism is the major job provider in these destinations. We have taught over 500 students since 2003.

Environmental Guidelines

• Reduce environmental impacts thru our operations.
• Use natural resources and recycled products grown and produced locally when possible.
• Maintain biodiversity.
• Reduce our carbon footprint to zero or preferably carbon positive.

Economic Guidelines

• Assess economic impacts before making decisions.
• Maximize local economic benefits by increasing linkages and reducing leakages.
• Ensure communities are involved in and benefit from our operations.
• Assist with local marketing and product development.
• Promote equitable business and pay fair prices.

Social Guidelines

• Involve local communities in planning and decision making.
• Assess social impacts of tourism activities.
• Respect social and cultural diversity.
• Be sensitive to the host culture.
• Provide complimentary air lift for local communities in case of emergencies.
• Develop English Language Schools thru Nature Kids Foundation.

The founder and CEO of NatureAir, Alex Khajavi, was kind enough to take time out to answer some questions for us.

Can you tell us more about Nature Air? How did the idea for the company come about and was it difficult to put into motion?
Back in 1999 we were working on sustainable tourism projects as consultants in Costa Rica and we were flying back and forth all over the country. The airlines at that time were not enjoyable and not reliable, the road conditions are horrible and a 60 mile drive can take 3-4 hours. By luck we were introduced to the owners of what was called Travel Air - before we really had time to think about it, we acquired Travel Air in August of 2001. Three weeks later, 9/11 happened and it was very difficult. But we had a strong plan and a good vision for being a safe, fun and reliable airline to fly - we did it and we have been successful. In fact, we are the fastest growing airline in Central America.

What makes Nature Air a better option for tourists than standard airlines?
We are reliable. We have a 94% on-time performance for over 4 years now, we don't leave our passengers stranded or cancel flights like other airlines do. We also have a strict policy of flying only all twin-engine aircrafts, we have a spotless safety record and we are the exclusive airline for the best tour operators worldwide and the top hotels in Costa Rica. We are also a sustainable airline - every ticket purchased goes to protecting tropical rainforests and helping children in the communities we fly to learn English and Environmental Best Practices in a shared curriculum with Rainforest Alliance. We give a lot more value to our guests than standard airlines.

How does Nature Air offset its carbon emissions?
We offset them via protection of primary tropical forests in the Osa Peninsula of Costa Rica. Through a government managed and internationally audited system, we measure our carbon footprint by taking 100% of our fuel consumption per year - based on this calculation we are able to know how many tons of carbon dioxide we emitted in the previous year. We then work with FONAFIFO to select privately held lands that the landowners have volunteered to participate in the program as a means to generate income through conservation of their lands and not extraction of the forests. Based on the amount of bio-mass  on the land and the age of the trees on these properties, we are able to determine that through conservation of these forests we are ensuring that the same amount of CO2 is not released into the atmosphere by providing the landowners with a means to survive without cutting down the trees.

Is there a chance of Nature Air expanding to provide services in other countries?
We in fact already fly to Bocas del Toro, Panama and by December 1 of this year we will be adding David, Panama and Panama City, Panama to our schedules from San Jose, Costa Rica. In addition to these new flights into Panama, after the 1st of December we will also be flying to Managua, Nicaragua from San Jose - we plan on growing within the region for years to come.

Can you tell us more about Nature Kids? How does this program help local communities?
One of the things we found out in 2003 was based on a study conducted by the University of Costa Rica - those Costa Ricans that speak English earn on average 40% more than those that do not. In addition, we are constantly working with our hotel partners and tour operators in the destinations we fly to, and the lack of English proficiency within the destinations was something that both the hotel operators and the community members wanted to improve. Therefore, in 2003 we opened up our first school in a small village outside San Jose, the capital city of Costa Rica. Based on the programs early success in teaching English, we had over 107 graduating students (from first year program) the first year, ranging from 5 years old to 62; we opened a second school in the Osa Peninsula of Costa Rica, one of the most isolated and biologically diverse areas on the planet. Since 2004, this second program has taught over 500 students of all ages. The program helps give people the skills to speak conversational English, which makes finding employment, especially in tourism (hotels, restaurants, tour operators, fishing, transportation, guides, boats etc etc) much easier. Last year, Nature Kids partnered with Rainforest Alliance to adapt a curriculum developed by Rainforest Alliance on environmental education and understanding the importance of tropical rainforests to our ESL curriculum. The RA environmental curriculum was originally developed for use by the public school system in the US, but it has proven extremely popular within our Nature Kids programs.

What other steps is Nature Air taking to have less of an impact on the environment?
One of the most important components of our Sustainability Policy here at Nature Air is that we are always striving to improve in reducing our impact, reuse whatever we can and recycle whatever we cannot reuse. This philosophy has helped us improve fuel efficiency since 2004 by 9%, meaning that for every hour of flight, we use 9% less fuel than we did 5 years ago. We did this because we felt that simply compensating our emissions was not enough, we need to reduce. We were able to do it by improving our flight plans, our schedules and training our flight crew on gradual ascents and descents - all of these improvements were done without changing aircraft!

Nature Air also has its own recycling center for use by our employees and other companies operating in our hub at San Jose -the recycling center is completely paid for by the company and free to use by others.

Since last year, Nature Air is also the first airline in the world to have its entire ground fleet of vehicles, machinery and heavy equipment running off of 100% recycled cooking oil, or bio-diesel. This is helping us reduce roughly 50,000 gallons of diesel consumption per year.

Nature Air was recently awarded the 2009 Tourism for Tomorrow Award from the World Travel & Tourism Council. Can you tell us more about this award and what it means?
This is the most prestigious award in Travel - it is the only award that one is nominated for by the top leading 100 companies in tourism worldwide, and perhaps more importantly it is the only one that includes on-site verification and audits of your sustainability programs. This means we had an expert in sustainable tourism and carbon sequestration and verification programs visit us for 3 days in Costa Rica - obviously he was impressed with what he saw and we went on to win. I think the verification gives integrity to the Awards, but more importantly, a lot of the time you do things based on "the best information you can get your hands on," as a private company our goal is first and foremost to be profitable, so we are not experts in sustainability. Yet, we understand that we have a responsibility to our employees, our shareholders, our clients and the communities we fly to - a business should always be considering the entire impact of its operations - so while we strive to do the best we can, we truly appreciate it when someone more qualified than us comes in and tells us we are on the right track, it gives us more motivation to only do more.