This paper explores people's willingness to reduce travel consumption in support of the transition to a low-carbon pathway beyond COVID-19, using new survey data from UK car drivers and air travellers. Evidence from our study indicates that reductions of 24% - 30% to car use and 20% - 26% to air travel could be sustained in the long term. This potentially could lead to annual reductions of 343–529 kgCO₂ per car driver (20% - 29% of pre-COVID-19 car emissions) and 215–359 kgCO₂ per air traveller (10% - 20% of pre-COVID-19 emissions from flying), suggesting that behavioural change may be a major route to emissions reductions. We find that stated voluntary reductions are greater among those who report having ‘more time to do creative things’ since the start of the COVID-19 lockdowns. Hence, recovery policies promoting low-carbon leisure time may be a key to consumption reductions. We also find that higher-income travellers consume and pollute substantially more than the rest, and yet there is little difference in relative voluntary reductions across the income distribution. We conclude that behaviour associated with affluence represents a major barrier to a low-carbon transition, and that policies must address over-consumption associated with affluence as a priority.

本文利用来自英国汽车司机和航空旅客的新调查数据，探讨了人们减少旅行消费以支持向 COVID-19 之后的低碳道路过渡的意愿。我们研究的证据表明，汽车使用量减少 24% - 30%，航空旅行减少 20% - 26% 可以长期持续。这可能会导致每位汽车司机每年减少 343–529 kgCO ₂（占 COVID-19 前汽车排放量的 20% - 29%）和 215–359 kgCO ₂每个航空旅客（占 COVID-19 之前飞行排放量的 10% - 20%），这表明行为改变可能是减少排放的主要途径。我们发现，自 COVID-19 封锁开始以来，那些报告有“更多时间做创造性事情”的人表示自愿减少的人数更多。因此，促进低碳休闲时间的恢复政策可能是减少消费的关键。我们还发现，高收入旅行者的消费和污染远高于其他人，但收入分配的相对自愿减少差异不大。我们的结论是，与富裕相关的行为是低碳转型的主要障碍，政策必须优先解决与富裕相关的过度消费问题。