Introduction & Purpose

This briefing note has been prepared for submission to the Environmental Audit Committee inquiry into The Airports Commission report: Carbon emissions, air quality and noise. The note is intended to summarise in an accessible form the commitments that Heathrow has made in relation to our new plan for expanding the airport.

Existing commitments

The Commitments set out below in relation to Air Quality & Surface Access, Noise and Carbon were built into the submission made to the Airports Commission and, where they are for us to deliver, have been costed within our business case.

We are clear – Heathrow expansion should only go ahead within strict environmental limits on noise, local air quality and in line with the UK’s climate change targets.

Air Quality & Surface Access

Heathrow will only expand within air quality limits and both the Airports Commission’s and our own assessment has demonstrated that this is possible.

Surface Access

New public transport options will provide an alternative to travelling to the airport by road. As a result our strategy will ensure that there will be no more Heathrow-related vehicles on the roads than today.
The proportion of passengers using public transport to access Heathrow will increase to more than 50% and the proportion of employees using public transport to over 50%.
By 2030 Rail capacity will increase from 18 to 36 trains per hour with seat capacity at almost 13,000 seats per hour;

Crossrail direct connection to the City of London, Canary Wharf and East London.
Western Rail Access will provide fast direct services to the Thames Valley and reduce journey times to the West and South Wales.
Connection to HS2 at Old Oak Common transforming journey times to key cities in the midlands and the north.
Southern Rail access improving connectivity to key catchments in South London, Surrey, Hampshire and the south coast.

The UK’s busiest bus and coach interchange at Heathrow will get bigger and better.
We will expand Heathrow’s employee car share scheme (already the world’s largest).
We will reduce the number of colleague car parking spaces.
We will be extending the existing airport travelcard to provide subsidised public transport to more airport colleagues.
We will work with local authorities and TfL to improve local bus services and cycle routes to the airport.
We will work with taxi and private hire companies, along with the bus and coach industry, to deliver more efficient use of vehicles and a cleaner vehicle fleet.
We will increase zero and low emissions vehicle use on and around the airport.
Our proposals for the M25 will provide the opportunity to improve traffic flow by segregating airport traffic and reducing idling emissions.
We will develop a new freight cargo consolidation centre to reduce freight deliveries and HGV movements to and from the airport.

Aircraft

Airport design will reduce holding on the ground ensuring aircraft, once landed, and before take-off, are held for minimum necessary time.
We will provide fixed electrical ground power and pre-conditioned air for all new aircraft stands to reduce the need for aircraft to run their auxiliary power units generating emissions.
We will continue to apply and develop emission-based landing charges. This will provide an incentive for operators to use aircraft that are the lowest emitting of their type.
We will also introduce “green slots” so that only the cleanest aircraft can use the capacity provided by a new runway.

In addition to the above Heathrow is already working on the three additional air quality mitigation measures that were suggested by the Airports Commission in their air quality assessment work.

These are;

Encouraging airlines to shut down an engine during taxi – we have established a provisional performance target and will continue to work with airlines to reduce engine emissions whilst taxiing.
Supporting on-going technological developments and innovation including industry research into the use of alternative fuels for aircraft - As a founding member of Sustainable Aviation, we’re engaged in a number of the technical working groups with industry partners including groups looking at aircraft emissions and noise. We are also supporting the development of sustainable aircraft fuels as outlined in the Sustainable Fuels Roadmap, and are actively supporting some of our airline customers looking to develop and deploy sustainable fuels for use at Heathrow. One particular example is the project being taken forward by Virgin Atlantic and their partners LanzaTech
Implementation of an Ultra-Low Emissions Zone (ULEZ) – through Heathrow’s Blueprint For Reducing Emissions we have committed to implementing vehicle standards in line with the ULEZ airside by 2025 establishing emissions standards for Heathrow buses and coaches aligned with London’s Ultra Low Emissions Zone.

Noise;

Our approach to noise management follows the principles of the ICAO Balanced Approach.

After listening to what we were being told through our Community and Stakeholder Consultations we developed our plans.

Quieter Planes

We will encourage the world’s quietest aircraft to use Heathrow, charging more for noisier aircraft to land and quieter aircraft less and introduce “green slots” so that only the quietest and cleanest aircraft can use the capacity provided by a new runway.
We will ensure that the noisiest aircraft (Chapter 3) will be phased out of the Heathrow fleet before a third runway opens.
There will be no Boeing 747-400 in operation by the time a third runway opens.
90% of the aircraft will be ‘next generation’ technology A380, 787 & A320Neo by the time the runway opens.

Quieter Operating procedures

We will route aircraft higher over London through steeper approaches and having aircraft touch down 700 metres further along all runways than they do today (displaced thresholds).

Runway location

The new runway will be one nautical mile further to the west than the previous proposal for a short third runway. Every mile further west an aircraft lands means it is flying approximately 300 feet higher over London on its landing approach.

Predictable and reliable respite

Feedback from local communities shows clearly that the principle of providing predictable breaks from noise – “respite” is very important.
Respite principles have been in place at Heathrow since the 1970s through runway alternation, whereby the landing runway is switched each day at 3pm. All options maintain the principle of runway so that those closest benefit from periods of relief.
We are also committed to introducing respite across a broader area of London than benefits from the current system of runway alternation, through alternating the flight-paths used for arrival and departure. Ultimately the design of airspace is a matter for Government policy, however we believe that designing flight-paths to maximise respite could mean that 95% of those overflown receive respite for at least 50% of the time.

Further research is needed to understand how best to provide respite. We are driving this debate and undertaking consultation and research with our local communities to provide a better understanding of what they value in respite and the best ways to implement a respite strategy. Consultation with the local community is absolutely critical in this subject.

Comprehensive noise insulation and compensation scheme

In response to our consultation with community groups and other stakeholders we have developed, costed and allocated £1bn to provide noise insulation and property compensation.

This noise insulation offer goes above and beyond UK policy requirements, expands on Heathrow’s previous proposals and is comparable to those offered by other European hub airports. In total, Heathrow estimates that over £700 million would be spent through this insulation package, an increase of over £450 million from that previously offered by Heathrow in its May 2014 submission to the Airports Commission, and an increase of over £610 million from its previous proposals for a third runway.
In total, over 160,000 homes would be eligible for insulation in areas from Windsor in the west to Richmond in the east. Over 35,000 homes in Hounslow alone would be eligible for full costs of the noise insulation package, with all homes in Heston and Cranford eligible. Similarly, all homes within the towns and villages of Wraysbury, Datchet, Sipson, Harmondsworth, Harlington, Colnbrook, Brands Hill and Stanwell Moor would be covered by the scheme.

“When compared to current noise levels fewer people are predicted to be affected across all metrics”. The Airports Commission.

The Commission’s analysis indicates that regardless of metric fewer people will affected by noise across all metrics. The Commission’s analysis assumes population growth, in their assessments of noise impacts in 2030, 2040 and 2050.

The following table presents the Airports Commission’s results for each of the airspace options (minimising Total people overflown, maximising Respite and minimising New people overflown) in 2040.

Source: Airports Commission ANCON modelling compendium of results

Ground noise.

Appropriate and innovative use of noise bunds including to reduce noise impacts for those affected by the new runway and surface access developments.

Carbon;

Carbon emissions from aircraft

The Independent Committee on Climate Change analysis has shown that a 60% growth in passenger numbers can be achieved while keeping absolute aviation emissions at 2005 levels and remaining within the UK’s Climate Change Targets.

This will be achieved through a combination of new aircraft and engine technology, more efficient operations and sustainable alternative fuels, as outlined in Sustainable Aviation’s CO2 Road-Map. We will stay actively engaged in Sustainable Aviation to support progress in reducing emissions, and will take action at Heathrow too.

We will eliminate routine stacking of aircraft over London – reduces fuel use and emissions.
We will design the airport to reduce holding on the ground and to ensure aircraft once landed, and before take-off, are held for minimum necessary time.

The global aviation industry and our international regulator, ICAO, have both set a target for aviation growth from 2020 to be carbon neutral. Work is underway through ICAO to agree a mandatory carbon offsetting scheme to achieve that. We will continue to actively support that work.

The global aviation industry has also set a target for a 50% reduction in net emissions by 2050. We are strong supporters of that goal. A global market-based measure will be critical to achieving it and we will continue to actively promote and support policy measures to deliver the 50% net reduction.

Carbon from energy use at the airport

A 3 runway airport in 2030 will produce over 60% less carbon from airport energy generation compared to our two-runway airport in 2010.

We are committed to making the construction and operation of a third runway as low carbon as possible. This will be achieved by a combination of less carbon-intensive heat and power supply technologies such as ground source heat pumps, thin film photovoltaics, and combined heat and power.

Carbon from surface access

All of the public transport measures outlined in the section on air quality will also result in carbon emissions.

Our strategy is predicted to reduce our carbon footprint from staff and passenger travel from 734kt CO2 today (2010) to 521kt in 2030 with a third runway, a reduction of 29%.

2 November 2015

Appendix