Sevilla, Spain – Barbados, France, Kenya, Spain, Benin, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Antigua & Barbuda supported by the European Commission, have announced they will form a ‘solidarity coalition on premium flyers’ to raise funds for climate action and sustainable development. Campaigners reacted to the announcement, which was made on the first day of the UN Financing for Development conference in Sevilla (FFD4).[1]

Rebecca Newsom, Global Political Lead of Greenpeace International’s Stop Drilling Start Paying campaign said: “Flying is the most elite and polluting form of travel, so this is an important step towards ensuring that the binge users of this undertaxed sector are made to pay their fair share. With the cost of climate impacts surging in countries least responsible for the crisis, bold, cooperative action that makes polluters pay is not just fair – it’s essential.”

“The obvious next step is to hold oil and gas corporations to account. As fossil fuel barons rake in obscene profits, and people are battered with increasingly violent floods, storms and wildfires, it’s no surprise that 8 out of 10 people support making them pay. Members of the Global Solidarity Levies Task Force and rich countries around the world should act upon this enormous public mandate: commit to higher taxes on fossil fuel profits and extraction by COP30, while ensuring that those being hit hardest by the climate crisis around the world benefit most from the revenues.”  

Greenpeace International maintains it is critical that the revenues raised from solidarity levies in Global North countries go towards the countries and communities most affected by the climate crisis, for example through helping to fill the Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage. 

With demand for a climate damages tax on big polluters fast gaining momentum globally, Greenpeace urges all countries to join and implement the commitments of the new solidarity coalition on premium flyers by COP30. It also calls on all governments to adopt bold taxes and fines on greedy oil and gas corporations for the damages they have caused, without delay.[2][3][4][5][6] 

ENDS

Notes:

[1] The Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development (FfD) takes place from June 30 to 3 July 2025 in Sevilla, Spain, with participation of Heads of State and Government, relevant ministers, and other special representatives. Official website

[2] Popularity of climate damages taxes on fossil fuel consumption and production. A global survey, commissioned by Greenpeace International and Oxfam International, found that 3 out of 4 people agree that wealthier airline passengers (i.e. those who fly more often, use business and first-class and or/private jets) should pay additional tax due to their outsized individual impact on climate change. The same survey found that taxing oil, gas and coal corporations for their climate damages is even more popular. 81% of people support this, while 86% support channeling the revenues from higher taxes on oil and gas corporations towards communities most impacted by the climate crisis.

[3] A call to action. The Polluters Pay Pact is a global alliance of more than 160,000 people on the frontlines of climate disasters, concerned citizens, first responders like firefighters, humanitarian groups and political leaders. It demands that governments around the world make oil, coal and gas corporations pay their fair share for the damages they cause. 

[4] 80% of the world’s population have never flown. A single transatlantic flight on a private jet can produce emissions equivalent to those generated by an average person over several years. Private jets are 10 times more carbon-intensive than commercial flights and 50 times more polluting than trains. 

[5] Recent Oxfam International research found that a polluter profits tax on 590 oil, gas and coal companies could raise up to US $400 billion in its first year. This compares to estimated loss and damage costs of $290-1045 trillion in the Global South annually by 2030. Further, Oxfam analysis found that the emissions of just 340 fossil fuel companies each year make up half of all global emissions – emissions of just one year are enough to cause 2.7 million heat-related deaths over the next century. 

[6] Over 100 climate groups are backing a ‘Climate Damages Tax’ on fossil fuels extraction. This could be imposed by OECD countries, which if introduced at low initial rate of US$5 per tonne of CO2e increasing by US$5 per tonne each year could raise a total of US$ 900 billion by 2030 to help the world’s poorest and most vulnerable with climate damages, and pay for damages caused by some of the worst extreme weather events last year. Greenpeace is calling on governments to introduce frequent flyer levies so that those who fly the most, pay the most, while preventing the expansion of the aviation industry. Private jets are an extravagant luxury which should be banned altogether.

Contacts:

Tal Harris, Global Media Lead – Greenpeace International’s Stop Drilling Start Paying campaign, +41-782530550, [email protected] 

Greenpeace International Press Desk: +31 (0) 20 718 2470 (available 24 hours), [email protected]