Lufthansa Passengers Contributed to 710,000 Tonne CO2 Offset in 2025

Lufthansa Group has revealed that passengers contributed to climate protection projects covering more than 710,000 metric tonnes of CO2 in 2025, a rise of approximately 20% year-over-year. The airline has also expanded its climate protection project portfolio to 14 projects, doubling the share of permanent removal projects to around 20% and including direct air capture for the first time.

Lufthansa's Green Fare offering, launched in 2023, enables passengers to contribute to CO2 reductions through sustainable aviation fuel use and climate protection project support. The expanded portfolio now includes avoidance projects—such as energy-efficient cookstoves and modular biogas plants—and removal projects that actively sequester CO2, including reforestation, biochar and direct air carbon capture and storage. The airline is working with project partners including myclimate, First Climate, Ceezer, Senken, Climeworks and 1PointFive, and is advancing technology-based solutions with Deep Sky, Airbus and Climeworks.

The growing passenger uptake of Lufthansa's climate programme reflects rising awareness among airline customers of their travel footprint, though voluntary offset contributions remain a small fraction of actual airline emissions. The shift toward permanent removal projects and technology-based solutions such as DAC marks a meaningful evolution in quality standards for airline climate programmes, responding to increasing scrutiny from regulators, NGOs and institutional investors about the environmental integrity of carbon offset portfolios. Including DAC for the first time signals Lufthansa's intent to support scaling of emerging removal technologies.

Lufthansa has set a target of achieving net-zero CO2 balance by 2050 and an ambition to halve net CO2 emissions by 2030 relative to 2019. Climate protection projects are positioned as a complement to the airline's own operational emissions reductions rather than a substitute, with SAF use and fleet renewal remaining central to its decarbonisation strategy. The doubling of the permanent removal share in the portfolio—and the introduction of DAC—aligns Lufthansa's programme more closely with the science-based guidance that removals should play an increasing role as residual aviation emissions prove difficult to abate through efficiency measures alone.

Key figure — 710,000 metric tonnes of CO2 covered through Lufthansa passenger climate contributions in 2025