Heathrow expansion: As the chancellor grapples with growth, she has another tight budget to consider
Heathrow expansion: As the chancellor grapples with growth, she has another tight budget to consider
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Rachel Reeves is supposedly someone who understands tight budgets. While she may not have all the cash she'd like to deliver her airport expansion plans, the real constraint is carbon. And Britain's carbon budget has, to use the fiscal parlance of the Treasury, very little headroom at all.
This isn't an academic point. Under the Climate Change Act, successive governments have a legal responsibility to meet successive five-year carbon budgets. The watchdog that oversees those budgets, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) of climate if you will, is the Committee on Climate Change. Its current advice is very clear that expansion of air travel in the UK will blow the budget unless cuts are found in other sectors.
This probably explains why the chancellor announced a new plan, coming later this year, on how the government will meet its carbon budgets. But it's very hard to see how she might do it. Read moreA long history of Heathrow expansion plansGreen groups criticise planned expansionJet breaks sound barrier for first time.
Using figures from the Department for Transport and airport operators, the growth in flight numbers as a result of more and more frequently used runways will increase UK carbon emissions by 92 million tonnes CO2 equivalent) by 2050. (The "equivalent" bit is important as flights have an additional global warming impact due to particles and water vapour they add to the atmosphere).
