Flight ticket prices 'to soar as climate change will make journeys longer

Boffins say climate change will increase journey times between the US and UK

Tom Gillespie | The Sun | 10 February 2016

FLIGHTS from the UK to the US could take longer because of the effects of climate change, according to a study.

Boffins say ticket prices could soar because pilots will have to fill-up on more fuel.

A trip from the states to the UK is actually expected to get quicker - but you will be in for long ride if you want to come home.

University of Reading researchers say global warming is likely speed up the jet stream - a powerful high-altitude wind that blows west to east across the Atlantic.

This means planes flying against it will be slowed down and journey times will be stretched.

When it's all totted-up experts says the longer journeys mean an extra 2,000 hours of planes in the air.

This would produce an extra 70 million kilogrammes of CO2 - the annual emissions of 7,000 British homes.

On average flights will only gain or lose a few minutes each way - but London to New York flights are twice as likely to take more than seven hours.

New York to London is twice as likely to take roughly five hours and twenty minutes.

Dr Paul Williams, from the University of Reading, told BBC News: "If you look at the round trips, the eastbound flights are getting shorter by less than the westbound flights are getting longer."

"So there is a robust increase in the round-trip journey time, which means planes spending longer in the air, when you add that up for all transatlantic aircraft you get an extra 2,000 hours of planes in the air every year, with $22 million extra in fuel costs and 70 million kg of CO2."

Journeys between Europe and North America fly through one of the busiest routes in the world with around 600 flights every day.

But the impact of climate change on the jet streams is likely to be felt all over the world.

Dr Paul Williams said: "We know what drives the jet stream, it's the temperature difference between the warm tropical regions and the cold polar regions at flight levels.

"We understand what that temperature difference is going to do in response to global warming, it's increasing, we are very confident that the jet stream is increasing as a consequence."

The study has been published in the journal Environmental Research Letters.