China, US and Europe pledge support for global aviation emissions pact

China, the US and Europe all pledged support on Saturday for a new deal to curb carbon dioxide emissions by airlines which is due to be finalised at a meeting of the UN's ICAO in September and is expected to go into effect from 2021. Aviation was excluded from last December's climate accord in Paris when countries agreed to limit the global average rise in temperatures to "well below" 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels.The proposed new deal on aviation, which aims to cap the carbon pollution of all international flights at 2020levels will be voluntary between 2021 and 2026 and then mandatory from 2027 for the world's largest emitters. Airlines in participating countries would need to limit their emissions or offset them by buying carbon credits from designated environmental projects around the world. ICAO has estimated that carbon offsetting will cost operators 0.2-0.6% of total revenue from international aviation beginning in 2025, and 0.5-1.4% from 2035. "Today, the United States and China are expressing their support for the ICAO Assembly reaching consensus on such a measure," the two countries said in a joint statement Saturday. The statement, released ahead of a G20 summit in the Chinese coastal city of Hangzhou, said both countries "expect to be early participants in the measure and volunteer to join". In a separate statement, the European Civil Aviation Conference (ECAC), a grouping of the EU and 16 other countries, said it would join the market-based plan from the outset and urged all other major airline operating states to do so.<br/>