Travel Impact Model

The Travel Impact Model (TIM) is a state of the art emissions estimation model that is built from public and licensable external datasets, based on the latest science. It aims to provide a single source of truth, as a public good, for calculating and presenting the climate impact of individual flight trips to passengers.

About the model

The model combines flight origin and destination, aircraft type, cabin class and seat configuration, load factors and average aircraft utilization to estimate CO2 emissions for each flight (per seat/passenger). The methodology output is free and available publicly via an API. More granular methodology and API access details can be found here.

Model principles

Accurate and validated with real-world data
Precise in distinguishing more and less emitting flights
Comprehensive in covering the full climate impacts of aviation
Futureproof across new technologies and aircraft designs
Transparent in methods, data sources, and assumptions
Consistent across airlines and industry stakeholders
Accessible and free to all users

Governance

The Travel Impact Model is administered by Google and overseen by an independent Advisory Committee that consists of world-leading experts on sustainability and aviation from industry, academia, policy and NGOs. The Advisory Committee is accompanied by a Secretariat that provides technical expertise based on scientific evidence. The Advisory Committee together with the Secretariat ensures that the Travel Impact Model continues to evolve as a public good, and future development of the model is executed with high rigor, integrity, speed and according to the latest science.