Sustainability In The Air

How Travalyst is transforming tourism through data-driven collaboration

Jan 16, 2025

Sally Davey, CEO of Travalyst, leads a non-profit coalition formed by Prince Harry to foster sustainable tourism through collaboration. She discusses uniting major travel companies like Google and Expedia to enhance eco-friendly practices. The conversation covers Travalyst's data-driven initiatives, including the open-source Travel Impact Model, which empowers travelers with carbon footprint insights. Davey envisions regenerative tourism that benefits local communities and emphasizes the importance of consistent sustainability metrics in reshaping the travel industry.

50:12

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Sally Davey

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Quick takeaways

Travalyst unites major travel brands to collaboratively promote sustainability metrics, creating a standard for responsible tourism practices across the industry.

The organization emphasizes regenerative tourism, aiming to enhance local communities and environments by fostering positive impacts rather than just reducing harm.

Deep dives

The Mission of Travelist

Travelist, founded by Prince Harry, aims to make sustainable travel mainstream by addressing the dual nature of tourism as both a force for good and a potential source of harm. With a focus on environmental impacts, the organization emphasizes the importance of supporting local communities, suggesting that travel should serve the interests of both visitors and residents. A unique coalition of major brands, valued at nearly $3 trillion, has been formed to collaborate non-competitively on sustainability goals, highlighting a significant shift in industry dynamics. Travelist operates as a neutral nonprofit, emphasizing transparency and collaboration to drive impactful change across the travel sector.

Intro

5min

Data-Driven Sustainability in Tourism

13min

Sustainable Tourism: Collaboration and Community Impact

24min

Nostalgia in Travel and Family Tales

3min

Embracing Nature and Life Lessons through Parenting

1min

Aspirations for Sustainable Tourism Data

2min

Navigating the Path to Sustainable Aviation

2min

In this episode, we speak with Sally Davey, CEO of Travalyst. Founded in 2019 by Prince Harry, The Duke of Sussex, Travalyst is a not-for-profit coalition that brings together leading companies from the travel and technology sectors.

Davey shares insights into Travalyst’s mission and its impact on making tourism more sustainable through collaborative data initiatives. She discusses:

How Travalyst has united competing travel giants like Google, Booking.com, and Expedia to work together on sustainability, creating a coalition with a market worth of nearly $3 trillion that shares data and standards non-competitively.
The critical role of data in driving change. Travalyst aims to create consistent, accessible sustainability metrics across the travel industry.
How the Travel Impact Model (TIM) has powered over 65 billion flight searches worldwide, helping travellers make informed decisions about their carbon footprint when booking flights. The model is open-source and freely available to all industry players.
Travalyst’s expansion into accommodation sustainability through their Data Hub initiative, which tracks 60 attributes across 6 environmental and social categories, and their certification program that has validated 49 sustainability standards.
Their vision for regenerative tourism that goes beyond reducing negative impacts to actively benefiting local communities, preserving cultural heritage, and enhancing environmental conservation.

Throughout the conversation, Davey emphasises the importance of balancing environmental and economic sustainability, the power of industry collaboration, and how data-driven decisions can transform tourism into a force for good.

If you LOVED this episode, you’ll also love the conversation we had with Sebnem Erzan, Global Head of Travel Sustainability & Transport at Google, who shares the tech giant’s vision for sustainable travel. Check it out here.

Learn more about the innovators who are navigating the industry’s challenges to make sustainable aviation a reality, in our new book ‘Sustainability in the Air’. Click here to learn more.

Feel free to reach out via email to podcast@simpliflying.com. For more content on sustainable aviation, visit our website green.simpliflying.com and join the movement. It’s about time.

Links & More:

Travalyst

Travel Impact Model

Flight emissions data shown in over 65 billion searches worldwide - Travalyst

First flights, now the Travalyst climate coalition turns to hospitality data - Skift