Willie Walsh's announcement is little more than an elaborate conjuring trick, designed to make the world believe that the airline industry is serious about climate change, while it carries on with business as usual.
It should come as no surprise. At every opportunity, the aviation industry has stood in the way of any move that would cut emissions. Just last week, BA flew business leaders from around the world to New York to attack technologies like video conferencing that could actually reduce emissions, as part of their new campaign "Face to Face".
Once you wade through a speech dripping with corporate greenwash, it becomes apparent that Walsh isn't actually committing the aviation industry to cutting emissions at all. Rather he wants to pay other countries and other sectors to make those cuts instead.
Climate scientists tell us that developed countries need to cut emissions by at least 80% by 2050, and that emissions need to peak and start declining by 2015. In this context, offsetting the emissions of the airline industry by buying as yet non-existent credits from other countries simply does not fit with this imperative.
Walsh has to realise that he can't simply offset the damage that his planes do to the climate. Last week, the UK's committee on climate change, which is tasked with advising government on how to reduce aviation emissions, agreed. In a letter to Ed Miliband it warned that carbon trading could not be relied on to cut emissions, and "in the long term the industry should plan for deep cuts in its own CO2 emissions".
Airline chiefs also pretend that big cuts can be delivered by "greener planes". It is true that over the last couple of decades planes have become slightly more fuel efficient, but any positive impact from more efficient planes has been wiped out by the massive increase in flights.
The industry also claims that new technology will mean that planes will be even more efficient in the future. But the fact is that there are basic technological restraints that make major improvements impossible to imagine. For example, the industry often bleats on about blended wing aircraft, but what they fail to mention is that airports would need to be rebuilt to accommodate these larger aircraft.
Planes powered by coconuts won't solve the problem either. Biofuels are touted as the silver bullet, yet the technology is far from ready, and as we saw during the sudden rush for biofuels a couple of years ago, it can lead to spiralling food prices for the world's poor and the trashing of rainforests.
Even if these massive problems could be overcome, there are serious doubts as to whether we could produce the quantities needed to fuel the entire aviation industry. To rely solely on biofuels, an area three times the size of Germany would be needed to produce enough fuel.
There is one solution to the problem. The focus has to be on stopping the expansion of airports. That means scrapping plans for new runways, like the one at Heathrow, and investing in alternatives like high-speed rail and more video conferencing. And when there isn't any alternative available, flying must be reduced.
But that's the one answer that Walsh and the aviation industry do not want to hear.
