Alaska Airlines makes conscious choices every day to reduce the impact of their operations in big ways—like purchasing the most fuel-efficient aircraft and using sustainable aviation fuels – and seemingly little ones like composting coffee grounds onboard and using locally made food and beverages. Every action has an impact. Alaska is also here to help their guests find ways to be a conscious traveler and lighten their carbon footprint.

Caring for the planet shouldn’t just be top of mind during Earth Month, it should show up in all parts of our lives. Reducing your footprint may seem like a vague or overwhelming task. But you can start by choosing one thing and doing it well.

Here are five ways Alaska Airlines is making progress, and how you can join them:

1. Be mindful at home and when you travel

Whether you’re traveling or venturing out in your local community, consider how small steps add up to big outcomes for the natural world around us.  

In Seattle, take the light rail to and from the airport, or to the Seattle Center to watch a Kraken game, where Alaska's partners at the Climate Pledge Arena are delivering lofty standards for large venues and sustainability. Alaska is proud to be part of the most sustainable arena in the world and to have signed The Climate Pledge to reach net zero carbon emissions by 2040. 

If you’re planning to travel to Hawaii, practice malama – which means to take care – by giving back to the community through volunteer activities with Alaska's partners at Travel2Change. The possibilities are endless — from planting native trees to cleaning up historical sites or beaches or learning more about native Hawaiian language and culture.  

In partnership with @travel2change, Alaska is connecting travelers to volunteer experiences throughout the Hawaiian Islands—because travel means more when you leave a positive impact on the communities you visit.
 

By giving back to the places you live and fly, you’ll get a truer sense of place and walk away with deeper, more meaningful connections from your travel experience. And isn’t that what travel is all about?

2. Ditch plastic for good

Did you know only 9% of plastic gets recycled nationwide? The rest usually ends up in landfills, is burned or finds its way into our oceans. The West Coast Wonders aircraft, adorned with marine life and named by Alaska's employee-driven “Green Team,” serves as a constant reminder of why Alaska Airlines does this work to reduce their climate impact through carbon, waste and water. 

The special Boeing 737-9 MAX aircraft was inspired by the beautiful places Alaska flies to and reflects their support for projects to restore local habitats and biodiversity up and down the West Coast.

While Alaska is proud of their industry-leading recycling program, they know they need to move to more renewable options and replace plastic entirely to protect our planet for the long-haul First, Alaska challenges you to ditch the straw—like they did in 2018. That year, the airline was the first major U.S. airline to replace plastic straws and citrus picks with marine-friendly alternatives on Alaska's aircraft. The effort, made possible with the help of environmental nonprofit Lonely Whale, eliminated 22 million pieces of inflight plastic waste every year since.

Last fall, Alaska tackled their top two waste-producing onboard products: switching from plastic water bottles to pouring Boxed Water on Alaska flights, and from plastic water cups to recyclable paper ones for water service. These steps eliminated nearly 1.8 million pounds of single-use plastics from Alaska flights each year. 

Even better, pledge with Alaska Airlines to #fillbeforeyoufly – bring your own disposable water bottle on your travels, keep it empty through security and fill er’ up at a water bottle filling station in the airport before you board your flight. Tag a photo of your refillable with #fillbeforeyoufly on social, and Alaska will plant two trees in your honor through the Bonneville Environmental Foundation—whose goal is to plant 1 million trees on the West Coast to help reduce pollution and restore habitats for local fish and wildlife.

3. Offset your flight

Alaska Airlines is on a journey to reduce the carbon impact of their operations. But aviation is one of the hardest areas to decarbonize. Thankfully, offset programs like The Good Traveler can help Alaska balance their footprint in the near-term.

The Good Traveler lets you offset the carbon emissions from your trip by investing in an offset project around one of the participating local airports. Alaska joined this program because of the projects it enables, grounded they are in the places they live and fly. Together through The Good Traveler, travelers have helped offset over 112,000 metric tons of CO2.

4. Go paperless and reduce waste

Alaska is no stranger when it comes to investing in tech. They pioneered the use of RNP, a navigation technology that decreases emissions, improves safety and even gets you to your destination faster. This past year, Alaska was also the first airline to implement new software called Flyways to support Alaska's efficiency-minded dispatchers in planning the most efficient routes to save time and carbon emissions.

But some aviation tech is in the palm of your hand. With the Alaska’s mobile app, you can check-in for your flight and get your boarding pass all on Alaska's app, eliminating the need to print paper boarding passes. You can also pre-order your favorite meal or snack you wish to enjoy onboard, which helps Alaska predict catering demand and eliminate food waste.

5. Join Alaska Airlines on the journey to net zero

Last year, Alaska announced their five-part path to net zero carbon emissions by 2040. This path includes operating as efficiently as possible including through use of the technologies mentioned above and using more electric vehicles at Alaska's airports. 

It also includes bringing up to 145 efficient Boeing 737 MAX aircraft into Alaska's fleet, each of which is 22% more fuel-efficient than the aircraft they replace. But the biggest change in Alaska's carbon footprint will come from using Sustainable Aviation Fuel or SAF.  

Alaska is proud to use SAF today from Neste, to work with SkyNRG Americas to advance production capability in the Pacific Northwest, and look forward to using more SAF, alongside airline partners in the oneworld alliance, through new offtake agreements with producers Aemetis and Gevo. And they're glad to be in good global company: oneworld has a shared commitment to achieve net zero, and to use 10% SAF by 2030. 

What can you do? Packing lighter for your trip helps us burn less fuel overall; each pound makes a difference to the airines' CO2 emissions. If each guest packed 5lbs lighter, it would decrease the CO2 emissions by 11,800 metric tons each year. So, next time you go maybe ask yourself do you really need those extra shoes? 

Making progress in sustainability requires action, innovation, accountability, and transparency. In 2021, underscoring the importance of the social and environmental sustainability goals, Alaska made a portion of their all-employee performance-based bonus pay dependent on progress in the airlines' carbon intensity, and a portion of long-term executive compensation dependent on improving racially diverse representation in leadership. In Alaska's upcoming annual sustainability report, they will share more about their progress and stories from the journey.