Heathrow’s third runway cannot be approved without changes to current climate policies, the government’s advisers have said. The Climate Change Committee (CCC) , externalsaid expansion can still go ahead but only if the aviation industry funds cleaner fuels and pays for machines that suck carbon dioxide out of the air. Making the industry pay could push up the cost of flying with a return trip to Alicante costing around £150 more by 2050, and a return to New York up £400 in today’s prices, it said. Once built, the expanded airport would produce more carbon dioxide than any other single sector of the economy by 2050.
Heathrow said expansion and climate goals were “not a choice” and it would deliver both. “Our advice today is clear – Heathrow expansion is not currently compatible with the UK’s Net Zero target,” said Nigel Topping, the CCC chair. “Government needs to ensure that the aviation industry takes responsibility for the emissions it creates and bears the costs of decarbonisation. Those conditions do not exist today.” The CCC report cannot block a new runway but it wants the government to pass legislation pushing responsibility for the long-term clean-up of aviation onto the industry.
The government would “carefully consider” the advice alongside other responses to its consultation according to the Department for Transport (DfT). The government has an ongoing consultation which aims to judge any expansion against four tests – economy, climate, air quality and noise. It does not approve a runway – that will come in a Commons vote expected later this year. The £33bn project would raise Heathrow’s capacity to 150 million passengers a year – up from 85 million.
A DfT spokesperson said any expansion would need to align with the country’s climate targets, but added it “could deliver around £40bn to the economy and support up to 60,000 local jobs”. The CCC has said carbon-removal machines must be deployed to cut more than a third of the emissions by 2050. But almost none of that technology currently exists at scale, and the committee says credible plans exist for just 1% of these engineered removals needed by the late 2030s. The committee argued making the industry rather than the government bear the costs of clean up was the fairest way of cutting carbon.
It believes the extra investment needed would likely be passed on to passengers but would be modest if spread over time. Phased across 25 years, the cost of a flight to Alicante would rise by a few pounds a year – “less than a cup of coffee each way”, Topping said. Heathrow expansion an ‘outdated’ risk, mayor says What’s the plan for a third runway at Heathrow Airport? However, the airline industry rejected the committee’s approach.
Tim Alderslade, chief executive of Airlines UK, said carriers backed the government’s target of net zero by 2050 but added that the transition “has to be affordable”. He warned that the CCC plan would put holidays “out of reach for millions” and turn the clock back to “a time when flying was the preserve of the rich”. Alderslade said the answer was airspace reform and scaling up sustainable fuels – such as those made from waste oil and plant matter. On carbon removals, he added this was more challenging to deploy, and the aviation sector “cannot and should not shoulder the burden of scaling up this industry alone”, and needed government support.
Some researchers believe the committee’s advice does not act as a barrier to Heathrow’s expansion and will fail to achieve the reduction in planet-warming gases required. Dr Lois Pennington of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research told the BBC that because cleaner fuel and carbon removal were unlikely to arrive at the scale needed, the only reliable way to stay within the UK’s carbon limits was to stop the expansion of flying – or even to reduce it. “We need to make sure that we are not flying more than we are now,” she said. Although the government has said it would consider the CCC’s advice, ministers have left little doubt it intends to proceed with the expansion.
Last week in response to opposition questions, Chancellor John Healey said of the expansion: “After years of delay, years of indecision, years of often vexatious challenge, we have given the go-ahead to this project quite simply because the economic case stacks up and will help bring growth.” A formal vote in the House of Commons will still be needed to approve the planning framework for Heathrow’s expansion, and that is expected later this year. Prime Minister Andy Burnham opposed a third runway before entering Downing Street, arguing it would divert investment away from the north and “trap it in London and the South East”. The Mayor of London, Lord Sadiq Khan, has also raised concerns about its climate and noise impact. The plan is also strongly opposed by many residents and councils under the flight path, with around 750 homes facing demolition to make way for the new runway amid long-standing concerns over noise and air pollution.
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