Pressemitteilung

Budapest Airport carbon neutral for the third year running

Budapest
23.01.2020

Pressemitteilung Budapest Airport (nur auf Englisch verfügbar)

Budapest Airport has been awarded ACI’s neutral airport carbon accreditation for the third year running, and thus remains a member of the elite club of airports which fully offset the carbon dioxide emissions generated in the course of their operation, in a sustainable manner. Budapest Airport is the only airport in the Central and Eastern European region to receive such accreditation.

BUD was the first airport in the CEE region to attain ACI’s neutral airport carbon accreditation in 2018, which it then extended in 2019, and managed to maintain for the third year running in 2020. The company received its third carbon accreditation yesterday at the Aviation Sustainability Summit organized by Airports Council International Europe (ACI Europe).

This prestigious international accolade means that, together with its partners operating at the airport, the company keeps a continuous balance between energy production and consumption, fully offsetting carbon dioxide emissions. It achieves this partly with a consistent environmental strategy and partly by compensating the remaining emissions.

Last year, Budapest Airport also joined the NetZero by 2050 initiative, whereby it undertook to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from the operation of the airport to zero. Budapest Airport has set itself the ambitious target to achieve operation with net zero carbon dioxide emissions ahead of the deadline, already by 2030, with the help of a comprehensive sustainability strategy.

Budapest Airport has implemented a series of environmental protection and energy optimization measures, in order to maintain carbon neutrality.

The airport operator established the Greenairport program in 2015, as part of which it works together with partners, companies and authorities operating at the airport on sustainability plans for the airport. As a result, whilst passenger traffic increased by 64% in five years, carbon dioxide emissions per passenger were reduced by nearly 50% over the last five years.

As part of its environmental protection program, the airport operator modernized the air handling and air conditioning systems of the terminals and service facilities. Numerous buildings at the airport were fitted with modern heat insulation, heating and hot water systems were also modernized. Heat loss has been reduced with the more efficient insulation of pipelines, whereby 170 000 cubic meters of natural gas per year can be saved, which is equivalent to the annual consumption of 113 detached houses.

The company pays special attention to developing transportation, both within and outside the area of the airport; it encourages the use of electric vehicles in its own fleet and by the ground handlers (both by purchasing electric vehicles and installing charging stations), whilst employees can get to the airport with the help of a joint ride sharing application developed by Budapest Airport and Hungarian ride sharing service provider Oszkár. The operator recently handed over dedicated parking spaces and an electric vehicle charging station near Terminal 2 for car sharing service providers, thus facilitating more environmentally friendly transportation for passengers.

Ferenc Liszt International Airport is a “city in a city”; a facility operating day and night on 1500 hectares, with huge green areas, complex infrastructure, its own police and fire-fighter units, its own power plant, drinking water wells, machine and vehicle pool. Budapest Airport considers it a top priority to operate this “city” responsibly, minimizing the environmental burdens resulting from operation. The company therefore decided ten years ago to join this global sectoral initiative aimed at reducing emissions, which currently involves 295 airports from 71 countries.