Recently, at a party, I spoke to a very nice elderly lady about life without a car – which is wonderful, by the way. I told them that I’m going to southern Italy with my family soon, by train, which I’m really looking forward to. She asked me if we didn’t for sustainability reasons fly would? Actually, the answer would have been: Yes, of course. I haven’t flown in years and see no reason to start again for a holiday in Italy.

Instead, to my own astonishment, I heard myself fussing around with hmpftjanaja, somehow, but flying for five people would have been pretty expensive. What nonsense, book a train, a couchette car and an overnight stay for five. Strange, actually I have experience with these conversations.

But it’s true: it often ends up with the other person justifying something, and I really don’t want that. I think that everyone should decide for themselves, and of course there can be good reasons for a flight (however, also (SZ Plus)). If it were up to me, flying would simply be significantly more expensive and that’s it, shifting Climate protection decisions from the state to the individual without serious price incentives has never been a good idea.

There are even more reasons why climate talks can sometimes be tricky: because the traffic light organized such a chaos around the actually sensible heating law (SZ Plus) for example. Or simply because there are now so many complicated terms circulating that one can lose track of something. Or do you know off the bat exactly what paludiculture, IRA and DACCS are all about? If not, I would like you to do so in the spirit of the Pentecostal understanding SZ climate ABC (SZ Plus) recommend, which will also appear in the printed weekend edition this Saturday.

I wish you a nice, long weekend.

(This text is from the weekly Newsletter climate friday you here for free can order.)