‘Blatantly incorrect’: Taylor Swift’s team respond to report on celebrity private jets

Tayor Swift’s team has responded after the pop star was "named and shamed" as one of the most prolific celebrity users of private jets.

According to separate analysis of CelebJets data by sustainability-focused data and tech agency Yard Group, when factoring in all flight lengths, pop star Taylor Swift was the worst offender this year.

She allegedly spent nearly 16 full days worth of time in the air, emitting 8,293.54 tonnes of Co2 and travelling an average of about 140 miles per flight, the report claimed.

However, Swift’s team has since denied the singer’s jet was solely used by her and said in fact it was often loaned out to other parties.

“Taylor’s jet is loaned out regularly to other individuals,” a Swift spokesperson told Rolling Stone. “To attribute most or all of these trips to her is blatantly incorrect.”

Members of the Kardashian family and Drake are also reportedly among the top offenders when it comes to taking disproportionately-polluting short flights on private jets.

Kim Kardashian’s private plane made four flights of under 20 minutes in the past two months, according to data from celebrity flight-tracker @CelebJets. The private plane belonging to her half-sister, Kylie Jenner, did twice as many, the tracker found.

One flight, on 24 July, saw Kardashian’s plane make a 40-mile, 10-minute journey between Van Nuys and Camarillo, California. The trip required 81 gallons of fuel and emitted 1 tonne of carbon dioxide (CO2) – about the same as a gas-powered car emits being driven for six months.

A customised Boeing 767 airliner owned by hip hop star Drake – named “Air Drake” – made five short flights in the same period. While other celebrity jets made greater numbers of flights, Drake’s plane reportedly spewed the most planet-heating emissions of all in the dataset due to its size.

The Boeing 767, normally used by airlines to fly a couple of hundred people on intercontinental flights, emitted 21 tonnes of CO2 on the five trips, the analysis found. This is the equivalent emissions to four US homes’ electricity use for a year, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

Drake attempted to defend the short flights in a recent social media post by saying that one flight flagged by CelebJets – an 18-minute trip between Hamilton, Ontario, and Toronto – was, in fact, empty.

“This is just them moving planes to whatever airport they are being stored at for anyone who was interested in the logistics … nobody takes that flight,” he wrote on Instagram.