This month marks one year since Bristol Airport submitted its plans to meet growing demand for air travel to and from the South West. Chief Executive Officer Dave Lees says it is now time to decide on airport expansion for the future of our region.
The first December election since 1923 unfortunately means another delay to the decision on plans to increase annual passenger numbers at Bristol Airport from the current limit of 10 million to 12 million.
The rules around ‘purdah’ – which prevent local as well as central government from making potentially controversial decisions during an election campaign - mean that by the time it is considered by North Somerset Council’s Planning & Regulatory Committee in the New Year more than 12 months will have passed since our planning application was submitted.
During this time the number of passengers using the airport has continued to increase (we expect the annual total for 2019 to be close to nine million) bringing us ever closer to reaching the cap imposed as part of our previous planning approval in 2011.
Doing so would mean turning away airlines looking to launch new routes and forcing people in this region to travel to airports in the South East in order to fly. Meanwhile, many other airports across the UK continue to grow unconstrained by local planning conditions.
Contemplating more flights when we there is rightly concern about the climate emergency can seem counter-intuitive for some. But, in fact, regional airports can be part of the solution by encouraging passengers to ‘fly local’ thereby reducing road journeys to London.
We have calculated that if passengers from the South West used Bristol Airport instead of Heathrow and Gatwick it would save an estimated 157,000 tonnes in carbon emissions.
This suggests that preventing people from using their local airport could have the unintended consequence of increasing carbon emissions.
As befits an airport serving a former European Green Capital, Bristol Airport is at the forefront of efforts to reduce emissions.
Earlier this year we published an ambitious carbon roadmap which brought forward our objective to be carbon neutral to 2025.
Since then we have switched to a 100 per cent renewable electricity supply and from January 2020 we will offset the carbon emissions from all surface journeys to and from the airport. Real actions which show we are serious about playing our part.
However, short of draconian measures such as banning flights for all but the privileged few, decarbonising aviation remains a challenge.
But progress is being made, as demonstrated by the introduction of new aircraft to the fleets operating at Bristol Airport - including the A320neo produced by Airbus, with input from talented engineers right here in our region.
Not only does this aircraft reduce emissions by 15 per cent compared to its predecessor, it is significantly quieter on landing and take-off, which is great news for local communities living near the airport.
Granting permission for Bristol Airport to grow will secure jobs, investment and tourism at a time when it is more important than ever to send a message that our region is open for business.
We have worked hard over the last 12 months on a package of measures which we are confident will address the impacts of growth on the local transport, communities and the environment.
Now it’s time for North Somerset Council to clear our exciting plans for take-off.
