Tourism is on course to thwart humanity’s efforts to reach a zero carbon economy because of its high growth rates and carbon intensity. To get out of its carbon predicament, the tourism sector needs professionals with carbon literacy and carbon capability. Providing future professionals in the full spectrum of tourism-related study programmes with the necessary knowledge and skills is essential. This article reports on ten years of experience at a BSc tourism programme with a carbon footprint exercise in which students calculate the carbon footprint of their latest holiday, compare their results with others and reflect on options to reduce emissions. Before they start, the students are provided with a handout with emission factors, a brief introduction and a sample calculation. The carbon footprints usually differ by a factor of 20 to 30 between the highest and lowest. Distance, transport mode and length of stay are almost automatically identified as the main causes, and as the main keys for drastically reducing emissions. The link to the students’ own experience makes the exercise effective, the group comparison makes it fun. As the exercise requires no prior knowledge and is suitable for almost any group size, it can be integrated into almost any tourism-related study programme.
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This chapter discusses tourism’s impacts on global environmental change. Tourism affects four key Earth-system processes under threat: biodiversity loss, freshwater availability, land-use change, and climate change. On a global scale, tourism impacts on climate change are most significant. However, on a local or regional scale, tourism can be a considerable driver of change in the other processes, sometimes to an extent of global proportions. The various components of tourism act differently in these processes. Tourism mobility as a whole is generally the most problematic. The causes of tourism impacts are explored per system process and mitigation priorities are addressed. Mitigation of impacts is essential, also for the sustainable development of tourism. Strategy development needs an integrated approach, as measures to solve one issue can be counterproductive for other processes and goals.
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With the Industrial Revolution and, more profoundly, the globalisation process of the last decades, both tourism and environmental issues have become increasingly global in occurrence. Globalisation processes amplify or replace many regional or national forces of change. Human activities have become the main cause of global environmental change (GEC), hence our era has been designated the ‘Anthropocene’. The Earth System could be approaching a planetary threshold resulting in a rapid warming pathway. In view of tourism's global importance, worldwide growth, and its tendency to create interdependencies between countries, it is appropriate to devote a chapter to the global environmental impacts of tourism. As participation in tourism increases in and between countries all over the globe, many of its environmental impacts are becoming scaled up to a global level. Minimising these guarantees a more stable system, which is also essential for tourism.
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