Truemors
Newquay Airport Expansion:
The Case Examined (Revised
Edition)
A report by Elizabeth Baines
Commissioned by Groundswell Cornwall
© Groundswell Cornwall 2007
www.groundswellcornwall.org
Chapter 4
The Environmental Case.
Summary
The
National Scene
1. The UK Government has set itself the
target of reducing its carbon emissions by 60% from 1990 levels by 2050 to
stabilise atmospheric CO2 concentration levels at 550ppm. However the IPCC has now stated that to avoid catastrophic
climate change the ceiling must be no greater than 450ppm. The current level is
384ppm. It is increasing at around
2ppm each year. (4.1)
2. While recognising its
responsibilities, the UK
Government continues to champion airport expansion despite the negative effect
on UK
emissions targets. (4.2)
3. The proportion of the UK’s
carbon emissions attributable to air travel will rise dramatically if present
trends are pursued, accounting for between about a quarter and a half of all
the
climate impacts caused by UK activities by 2050. (4.3, 4.4)
Newquay Airport
4. Cornwall County
Council claims a reduced environmental impact due to the closure of RAF St
Mawgan. This does not exonerate it from considering the impact of the planned
1.2m passengers it plans to accommodate by 2030. Nor are claimed ‘benefits’
explained. (4.5)
5. Noise and local air
pollution will pose an increasing problem around the site with increased road
congestion and overhead noise disturbance. (4.6, 4.7)
Climate change in Cornwall
6. The County Council’s
Transport Plan describes reduced problems of congestion and reduced problems of
air pollution as key areas for attention. (4.9)
7. Improved technology will
not bring the emissions reductions required within the timescales envisaged.
New aircraft may not be less polluting. (4.10)
8. Seeking accurately to
estimate the carbon footprint of different forms of travel is complex and open
to misinterpretation. Nevertheless on all counts air transport is calculated as
the most environmentally damaging form of transport. (4.12)
9. Calculating the ‘social
damage’ costs of transport are imprecise and, as a result, misleading,
especially because so many of the effects of climate change are unpredictable
and therefore unmeasurable. (4.13)
10. 96.4% of all passengers to
using Newquay Airport arrive by car. Prospects for
developing public transport to and from the airport are very limited and
whereas additional car parking facilities are being developed, no provision has
been made for additional public transport services. Every increase in passenger
numbers will increase CO2 emissions and
congestion around the
airport. A reduction in air passenger numbers by removing the subsidies that aviation
benefits from to increase the cost of flying would alleviate congestion and
help tackle greenhouse gas emissions. (4.14, 4.15)
11. There is no evidence of
any investigation into the comparative benefits of investment in improving
public transport alternatives to airport expansion. (4.16)
12. Airport expansion projects have
frequently ended up leaving the taxpayer to foot the bills for improvements in
transport infrastructure around the airport. (4.17)
13. The introduction of the
EU Emissions Trading Scheme will mean that either a) the cost of flying does
not fall as planned and airport expansion is unwarranted or b) the aviation
industry is able to absorb the cost of more permits, meaning that all other
sectors of the economy have to decrease their emissions disproportionately.
(4.18, 4.19)
The
national scene
…the
Government believes more needs to be done to reduce and
mitigate
the impacts of air transport and airport development.70
The
Government recognises the benefits that the expansion in air travel has brought
to people's lives and to the economy of this country. Its increased
affordability has opened up the possibilities of foreign travel for many
people, and it provides the rapid access that is vital to many modern
businesses. But we have to balance those benefits against the environmental
impacts of air travel…71
Department for Transport, The
Future of Air Transport –
White
Paper and the Civil Aviation Bill, December 2003.
4.1 The UK
Government’s emissions targets.
At Kyoto in 1997, European Union Member States
collectively agreed to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by 8% below 1990
levels by 2008 to 2012. The UK’s
legally binding target is to reduce its emissions by 12.5% over this period.
Following the 2003 Energy
White Paper, the UK
pledged to reduce its CO2 emissions by 60% by 2050, from 1990 levels. This
target is based on 550 parts per million (ppm) as being the maximum tolerable
atmospheric CO2 concentration according to the Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change (IPCC) Second
Assessment Report 1995.
The IPCC’s
third report has since suggested that a lower concentration limit will be
required; atmospheric CO2 levels are already at 384ppm and are increasing at
over 2ppm each year. To prevent catastrophic climate change, this level must be
stabilised at 450ppm.72 At current rates of increase this will be reached within 25 years.
4.2 Achieving UK
emissions targets.
The Government continues to
champion airport expansion despite its goals to limit carbon emissions. The
2003 Aviation White Paper states that a balanced approach should ensure that
‘over time, aviation pays the external costs its activities impose on society
at large - in other words, that the price of air travel reflects its
environmental and social impacts’.73 Yet it sets a policy framework that supports a major expansion in
aviation activity, which would enable air passenger movements to increase from
about 200 million in 2003 to about 470 million in 2030.74
The environmental impact of
such an increase in passenger numbers would be severe. The Royal Commission on
Environmental Pollution (RCEP) 2007 Special Report comments that:…if the
recommendations on CO2 emissions from ground level activities predicted in the
Commission’s 22nd report are achieved, and the growth in air transport projected by
the IPCC materialises, then air
travel will become one of the major sources of anthropogenic climate change by
2050.75
The Department for Transport
likewise acknowledges the difficulty that the Government will have in reaching
its’ carbon emissions targets if the planned increase in air travel is to go
ahead. If fulfilled, the predicted growth in aviation ‘could amount to about a
quarter of the UK's
total contribution to global warming’ by 2030.76
The Tyndall Centre for
Climate Change Research warns in their 2006 report that: UK Government aviation
emissions forecasts show aviation taking up between 50% and 100% of the 450ppmv
[parts per million by volume] UK carbon budget by 2050 and between 24% and 50%
of the 550ppmv target. Moreover, results from scenarios that take into account
the current very high rates of growth being seen within the industry show
aviation taking up between 77% and 100% of the 450ppmv UK carbon budget by 2050
and between 38% and 50% of the 550ppmv 2050 target. The conclusion of which is
an observation that the UK
Government's aviation forecasts need to be updated as a matter of urgency.77
The ambiguity of the message
being given by the Government over carbon emissions reductions creates
complications for local government seeking to act on CO2 emissions.
Nevertheless the IPPC and Tyndall Centre for Climate Change message is clear:
expanding Newquay Airport will encourage people to travel further distances at
a time when there is an ever more pressing need to reduce emissions.
Cornwall County Council has a duty to
consider the wider implications of airport expansion and the message being
given to the local population when it examines the case for expansion.
4.3
The impact of air travel on the atmosphere
We
must do more to reduce the environmental effects of aviation.78
Department for Transport, The
Future of Air Transport –
White
Paper and the Civil Aviation Bill, December 2003.
Unlike car or rail, air
travel releases emissions at a high altitude. Whereas the most serious impact
of aviation is undoubtedly its contribution to climate change, there is much
that remains unknown about the extent of the environmental damage caused by
aircraft emissions.
As well as triggering climate
change, air travel causes:
a) Stratospheric ozone
reduction, which leads to increased surface UV radiation. (Stratospheric ozone
absorbs radiation from the sun, thereby protecting life on the earth’s surface
from the harmful effects of UV radiation.)79
b) Regional pollution,
including changes in tropospheric chemistry for tens to hundreds of kilometres
downwind of the airport. Water vapour emitted in the troposphere can lead to
condensation trails which can trigger the development of cirrus clouds.
Contrails and cirrus clouds reflect solar radiation and cool the surface, and
re-emit thermal radiation downwards, warming the surface, and upwards. The
warming effect is thought to dominate. Cirrus clouds may also be further
influenced by particles emitted by aircraft.80
c) Noise pollution and
decreased air quality.81
Whether they are flying at a
low or high altitude, aircraft impact negatively on the atmosphere and
contribute to global warming. Furthermore, the environmental damage and effect
on climate change by aircraft emissions such as NOx at high altitudes is worse
than that from CO2 alone. The Department for Transport confirms that: The environmental impacts of aircraft have
been assessed by the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change (1999) and more recently by the Royal Commission on
Environmental Pollution (2002), and they are thought to be 2-4 times greater
than that from CO2 alone.82
4.4
The Radiative Forcing Index.
…it
will be impossible to reduce the UK’s climate change impacts to the
extent needed to meet international aspirations unless there is demand
restraint in the aviation industry.83
Due to the amplified damaging
effects of aircraft emissions released at altitude, the IPCC
has produced an index for comparing CO2 with non-CO2 impacts for aviation
called the Radiative Forcing Index (RFI). This index provides a measure of the
importance of aircraft induced climate change other than that from the release
of fossil carbon alone.
Working on the assumption
that aviation grows at the central forecast rate envisaged in the Governments’
2003 Aviation White Paper and assuming that all other sectors reduce their emissions
to achieve the 60% reduction in emissions by 2050 from 1990 levels, as set out
in the Government’s 2003 Energy White Paper, then forecasts of aviation’s
contribution to the UK’s climate change impacts are as follows:
Radiative forcing effects of aviation as a percentage of the total
radiative forcing effects of UK
activities*
Year
2010 9.0 to 23.9%
2020 13.5 to 33.0%
2030 18.0 to 41.0%
2040 21.8 to 46.8%
2050 26.6 to 53.3%
Source: UK Environment Research Centre, Predict and
Decide (II),
June 2006.
* Note that the lower band of
these figures is below that of the 2000 figures, because an RFI of 1-1.5 has
been used for non-aviation sectors after 2000.84
If air travel were to grow as
forecast, aviation would account for between about a quarter and just over a
half of all the climate impacts caused by UK activities by 2050. All other
sectors would have to make a dramatic reduction in their own carbon emissions
to compensate for those emitted by the aviation industry.
Figures from the 1999 IPCC report and the Government’s 2003 Energy White
Paper suggest that aviation is responsible for less than 4% of the UK’s
climate change impact. These figures are misleading; the White Paper excludes
international aviation and the IPCC
figure is a global average. The percentage given does not therefore reflect the
UK’s
proportionate contribution to aviation emissions.
The Environment Research
Centre (ERC) concludes that the damage caused by aviation in the UK is
much more serious than this. The ERC calculates that:
- by 2000 aviation already
accounted for between 10% and 19% of the impact on climate caused by UK
activities - aviation’s relative
contribution to the UK’s
climate impacts approximately doubled between 1990 and 200085
Moreover, the Department for
Transport asserts that ‘twenty per cent of international passengers start or
finish their journeys at UK airports.’86 If a fifth of all international air travel passes through a UK airport then the UK’s
contribution to global carbon emissions from aviation must be much greater than
that of other countries. It seems that the UK already accounts for much more
than its share of carbon emissions for this sector.
Newquay
Airport.
4.5 The local environment
Our
aim is to limit and, where possible, reduce the number of people significantly
affected by aircraft noise. Today's aircraft are 75% quieter than jets in the
1960s.87
Department for Transport, The
Future of Air Transport –
White
Paper and the Civil Aviation Bill, December 2003.
Cornwall County Council’s
Planning Committee maintains that ‘it is considered unlikely there will be any
significant impact on ecology or nature conservation interests [in the vicinity
of Newquay Airport]’88 despite the site being situated adjacent to an Area of Great Landscape
Value.
The airport similarly
maintains that the cessation of military operations at the base will lead to an overall reduction of activity in
the area with ‘reduced impacts both during
the day and at night’.89
The exact level of past RAF
activity is not known. However the plans for civil expansion must be judged on
their own merit, not against other uses for other purposes.
Mid-level air passenger
forecasts are that ‘by 2030, the annual number of passengers will have grown to
over one million’. 90 If the volume of air traffic were to increase as forecast, there
would be a significant impact on the surrounding environment and a large
increase in activity around the site.
Cornwall County Council argues that
the adverse environmental impacts caused by the expansion of Newquay Airport
can be ‘brought within acceptable limits when considered against the wider
benefits of the development’.91
It is not clear how this
equation has been constructed.
Trading off environmental
degradation against economic benefit is complex and requires a detailed cost
benefit analysis. There is no indication that this has been carried out.
Yet even with a detailed cost
benefit analysis, it is impossible to calculate the exact magnitude of the
damage that environmental degradation can cause, economic or otherwise (see
4.13). Furthermore, the economic benefits that will be brought to the county
through Newquay Airport’s expansion are questionable,
not least because of the ongoing deficit at the airport (see chapters 3 and 5).
Cornwall County Council also claims that:
In terms of the wider debate regarding the Aviation White Paper
and the expansion of the airport, this is an unwarranted debate in relation to
this particular application.92
No justification is given for
this position.
Cornwall cannot be exempted from
reducing its carbon emissions because of
its economic difficulties and Objective 1 status, nor is Newquay Airport exempt from the debate surrounding the 2003 Aviation
White Paper.
4.6 Local air quality
Defra argues that emissions
produced during aircraft take-off and landing add relatively little to overall
pollution levels at ground level and are typically much lower than emissions
produced by road traffic to and from the airport.93
On this basis, Newquay Airport asserts that:
In addition to CO2, HST and even newer diesel technology trains
also emit significant quantities of NOx and PM10 at ground level during their
entire journey that affect local air quality, as do cars. The corresponding
emissions from aircraft departing Gatwick and Newquay only affect local air
quality over a very limited area in the close vicinity of the airports.94
Concentrating such emissions
in one limited area does not minimize the effect of such emissions; arguably it
makes them worse. Furthermore, as discussed in 4.3 and 4.4, aircraft emit
greenhouse gases such as NOx at high altitudes, the effects of which are more
damaging than if released ground level.
Defra maintains that the
relative contribution of aircraft to CO2 levels is expected to remain because
whereas air travel is forecast to grow, road vehicles are expected to become
cleaner.95
This is a highly misleading
argument. Improvements in vehicle efficiency are only taking place very slowly.
By contrast, car ownership is increasing; in 2005 there were 32.89m licensed
vehicles in the UK,
up from 32.25m the previous year.96
It is disingenuous to claim
future improvements in vehicle efficiency as an excuse for further increases in
emissions. Given the Government’s high aims for carbon emissions reductions, it
is impracticable to consider replacing emissions in one industry with emissions
from another.
4.7 Noise pollution
Technological advances over
the past decades have decreased the noise pollution caused by aircraft. Yet
aircraft noise remains problematic.
Although Newquay Airport’s
location is relatively remote, noise will nonetheless have an impact on local
residents and the local environment.
The nearest residential
properties from the compound are situated at Little Carloggas, approximately
125 metres north of the site. Cornwall
County Council’s Planning Committee states in their 2007 planning application
that during the two year development of the airport ‘there will be occurrences
when the acknowledged levels of acceptability [for noise] will be exceeded’ at
Little Carloggas.97
The Committee recognises
that:
At some receptor locations, the predicted construction noise
levels at certain stages of construction will cause an increase in ambient
noise levels and will exceed the guidance criteria…in particular during
night-time working.98
The noise increase from the
rise in traffic congestion around the airport is likely to be significant.
Following the 2 year work period, although the number of heavy goods and other
work vehicles will decline, congestion is likely to worsen due to increased
numbers of air passengers arriving at the airport by car if numbers rise as
forecast.
The Planning Committee does
not make any comment on the noise disturbance that will be caused by the
proposed increase of flights leaving the airport, nor is there an estimate of
the noise disturbance caused by the dramatic increase in the base level of
traffic that will take place to accommodate the 61.4% predicted rise in
passenger
numbers by 2011.99
4.8
Action by the aviation industry to tackle climate change
The Aviation White Paper
emphasises the need for ‘voluntary action by airlines, airports and aerospace companies to control
greenhouse gas emissions and develop sustainability strategies.’100 However, improving the
environmental standards and efficiency of aircraft is an expensive and
challenging task and relying on the aviation industry’s good will is not
necessarily the most effective way to reduce aircraft emissions.
Ryanair, the second most
important airline to serve Newquay Airport in terms of numbers of passengers,
has been criticised twice in the past year for exaggerating its environmental
credentials. In July 2007 the ASA banned an advertisement by the company in which
they claimed that aviation made up only 2% of CO2 emissions.
The UK government figures for domestic and
international flights leaving the UK put the figure at 5.5%.101 In January 2007 Ryanair
claimed that it had cut its CO2 emissions by half in recent years. When faced
with widespread criticism, they later admitted that this had been “a mistake”.102
Climate change in Cornwall
4.9 Cornwall
County Council’s
commitment to tackling climate change
Local
communities are involved at the planning stage but they should not be given the
right to veto expansion plans.103
Cornwall County Council, November 2005.
The Cornwall Provisional Local Transport Plan
2006-2011 sets out the key areas that the Government has identified for local
authorities to address. These include: ‘reduced problems of congestion’ and
‘reduced problems of air pollution’.
The Transport Plan’s aims
include, amongst others:
- improving access to key
services an
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