Bristol, Stansted, Leeds Bradford and Southampton airports will lead an increase in carbon emissions of up to eight times more than previously claimed. It also found that the proposals on the expansion of these four airports had overestimated their economic benefits by failing to account for the monetised cost of emissions caused by the expansions, which is worth up to £13.4bn.
Accordingly, the think tank questioned whether the decision makers in fact has access to reliable evidence upon which they based their determination, and further, whether local authorities are even the appropriate persons to evaluate the climate cost of airport expansions.
Therefore, the NEF recommended the Secretary of State to withdraw the airport planning applications which are currently active, and to assemble “a more robust and precautionary evidence base” on climate issues. “This evidence can be measured against the forthcoming aviation decarbonisation strategy and the government’s new 2035 emissions target, which is expected to include international aviation emissions,” the organisation added.
Meanwhile, the author of the report, Alex Chapman, pointed out that the findings raised concerns over the level of scrutiny the proposals had been subject to. Therefore, he called on the Secretary of State to conduct an independent review of all of these proposals and their compatibility with the United Kingdom’s climate commitments.
Other findings published in the report include a six times increase…
