More Philanthropy

It was announced this week that the British billionaire Richard Branson has decided to donate all of the profits from the travel companies in his Virgin Group to research into sustainable energy and global warming over the next 10 years.

In many ways this is indeed great news - big business is waking up to the fact that oil is running out and trend for dirt cheap flights is destroying the planet. Branson has even gone as far as saying that short haul flights should be phased out where a train service existed. Branson's move will mean something around $3 billion dollars going into research into green airline fuel.

Branson is of course to be commended - I certainly could not see that awful gobshite Michael O'Leary of Ryanair doing anything as farsighted. But will he actually cut the number of short flights? We have got to cut down on these inexpensive short hop journeys. Branson, since he also owns a train company, will not lose out as much as some of the other low-cost airline bosses if the market is curtailed.

Personally, I think the day of low-cost flights is nearing its end - the reason is not of course that people are waking up to the tons of CO2 they pump into the atmosphere, but to the fact that oil will become so expensive over the next few years that flying will once again become an occasional luxury rather than as cheap as taking the bus. Unless, of course Branson comes up with the goods and some kind of "bio-kerosene" will fuel airplanes in the next decade.