Gatwick runway: Labour approval a dereliction of climate duties

Today, 22 September, transport secretary Heidi Alexander granted consent for the Gatwick Airport Northern Runway application. The expansion plans have been slammed by environmental campaigners as proof of Labour’s abandonment of its climate pledges.

The plans were given to the Planning Inspectorate for examination by Gatwick Airport Limited on 6 July 2023. They were then accepted for examination on 3 August 2023.  Flights are set to take off from the new runway as early as 2029.

‘No real economic benefit’

Gatwick is currently the busiest single-runway airport in the world. It already has a second runway for emergencies. However, this can only be used when the first runway is closed, as it’s too close to the original to allow both to be used at the same time safely.

The new plans approved by Alexander involve rebuilding the second runway 12 metres to the north. This would be enough distance to get around the regulations preventing the simultaneous use of both runways.

However, the approval of the plans is being taken by green groups as proof of Labour’s dereliction of its climatological duties. At a dinner with air-travel bosses earlier this year, Heidi Alexander stated that she “believes in airport expansion” and that she is “not some kind of flight-shaming eco-warrior”.

Reacting to the runway announcement, Green Party leader Zack Polanski said:

Signing off on a second runway at Gatwick is a disaster. It ignores basic climate science and risks undermining efforts to tackle the climate crisis.

Labour keeps wheeling out the same nonsense about growth, but at what cost? What this really means is more pollution, more noise for local communities, and no real economic benefit.

“Expanding Gatwick is a tired, 20th-century answer to a 21st-century crisis. Labour’s obsession with growth at all costs is driving us deeper into a climate breakdown and social inequality crisis.”

In 2022, UK flights produced 29.6 million tonnes of CO₂ equivalent emissions. This was about 7% of the UK’s total greenhouse gas emissions. However, most other sectors are much easier to decarbonise than aviation. Cars and lorries can be converted to electricity, but aircraft are another story entirely.

As such, the independent Climate Change Committee predicts that aviation’s share of UK emissions will go up from 7% in 2022 to 9% in 2025. Then, they’ll account for 11% in 2030, and 16% in 2035.

Ruinous decision over Gatwick runway

Rosie Downes, of campaign group Friends of the Earth, said the Gatwick runway:

With emissions from aviation rising as climate extremes increasingly batter the planet with more intense floods, droughts and wildfires, it’s a struggle to see how the government can conclude expansion at Gatwick is a wise move.

She also questioned the logic of the economic case for the expansions:

Any growth in air passengers leaving the country is likely to mean more UK tourists using their spending power overseas than anything we might gain from visitors.

Common sense would see the government championing measures that will both improve our lives and protect the planet if it’s serious about sustainable growth, such as upgrading the nation’s public transport infrastructure.

If we’re to meet our legally-binding climate targets, today’s decision also makes it much harder for the government to approve expansion at Heathrow.

The government claims that this will allow Gatwick to support an extra 80 million passengers a year. It’s also expected to bring in £1bn extra in economic activity, along with 14,000 new jobs.

To put this into perspective, the UK is committed to £11.6bn in International Climate Finance between 2021/2022 and 2025/2026. That’s an average of just under £3bn a year on adaptation and mitigation strategies.

The climate crisis caused at least 16,500 heat-related deaths in European cities this summer alone. At this point, the UK government allowing expansions in one of the hardest sectors to decarbonise long-term is nothing but a short-sighted grab for economic gain, and a demonstration of folly that will likely cost the world dearly.

Featured image via the Canary