He said offsets were a powerful weapon in the fight to reduce greenhouse gases because the aviation industry could not cut emissions in the way other transport and energy sectors could.

Asked if they could become mandatory, Mr Turnbull said: "I think that's possible.

"In the future you may well find this is something that airlines feel obliged either from a regulatory or a competitive point of view to take up themselves overall."

The minister said some types of emissions were hard to eliminate.

"It is difficult to see a zero-emission aircraft, for example," he said.

"When you look at the sources of emissions, you realise there are going to be some types of emissions that you can really only offset."

"I think aviation for the foreseeable future falls into that category."

Carbon offsets work by calculating a flight's emission per person and making an equivalent payment towards such measures as planting trees or funding renewable energy.

Mr Turnbull said some countries and sectional interests had ulterior motives in arguing against aircraft emissions.

"You will see in Europe, for example, great concern expressed in some quarters about emissions from aviation not unrelated to promoting tourism in Europe as opposed to tourism in far-flung places like Australia and New Zealand."

To meet long-term greenhouse targets in the range of 50 per cent emissions cuts by 2050, Mr Turnbull said massive reductions would have to come from other sectors.

"Whichever goal you pick, you cannot reach that big level of reductions unless you have all of your stationary energy or almost all of it from zero-emission sources, and I would say most of your terrestrial transport as well."

The Federal Government has yet to commit to a greenhouse target, while Labor supports a 60 per cent cut by 2050.

Qantas chief executive Geoff Dixon said the airline had a target of cutting its emissions by two million tonnes by 2011.

"There's no denying that the air transport industry is the fastest growing of all the transport industries, and it is very important for us to make real attempts to minimise our footprint," Mr Dixon said.

Qantas tomorrow will spend $500,000 to offset the emissions of all its 950 flights that day, accounting for 40,000 tonnes of carbon.

The money will be spent on planting and maintaining 90,000 mallee eucalyptus trees around the nation through offset company CO2 Australia.

After tomorrow, the onus is on passengers to voluntarily pay the offset. For example, a return trip between Sydney and Canberra would have an offset worth $1.75.

The airline pilots' union called the scheme "economy class" and complained that airline workers were not consulted.

"Further to a one-day feel-good presentation, Qantas could make a real impact on its environmental footprint by taking a close look at the way it manages its fleet," Australian and International Pilots Association president Captain Ian Woods said.

The union called on Qantas to consider such measures as reducing the practice of aircraft burning fuel on the ground waiting for passengers at congested airports, as well as flying lower and avoiding patterns of moist air to reduce the concentration of the emissions released. 

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