1145 | 597 | Does cutting airport slots reduce climate impact? The Amsterdam Schiphol Airport case | Frédéric DOBRUSZKES, Pere SUAU-SANCHEZ, Giulio MATTIOLI
The aviation sector significantly contributes to climate change, despite only a minority of the global population participating in air travel and even fewer flying frequently. The industry has no short-to-medium-term scalable technological solutions to reduce its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions significantly. To date, gains in fuel efficiency have been more than offset by traffic growth. The only option to reduce GHG emissions would thus be to curb the number of flights and/or distances flown, since longer flights have higher emissions per flight and are responsible for a disproportionate share of total GHG._x000D_
In this context, the Dutch government announced in June 2022 a reduction in the number of available slots at Amsterdam Schiphol Airport from 500,000 to 440,000 from November 2023. The implementation of the government policy was later moved to 2024, but the airport manager decided to reduce the quota to 460,000 from the winter 2023-2024 season to provide more visibility to airlines. The reduction of slots mainly seeks noise reduction but also claims climate mitigation benefits. However, the volume of GHG emissions depends on the distances flown, not only on movement numbers. If that is not taken into consideration, emission reductions are not guaranteed. _x000D_
In this context, our study investigates the balance between the future number of flights and distances flown in various scenarios compared to the 2019 reference. We explore a range of assumptions, including: all markets are equally affected; only the shortest flights are cut; more short-haul flights are cut to allow for more longer flights; flights are saved based on KLM network/connectivity strategy in the context of its hubbing operations. Our results would show that only in some scenarios GHG emissions decrease, i.e., that in some scenarios, emissions can grow despite a slot reduction.
Frédéric DOBRUSZKES, Pere SUAU-SANCHEZ, Giulio MATTIOLI
Free Brussels of Brussels (ULB), Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, Cranfield University, TU Dortmund University
ID Abstract: 597