Consultative Committee of Ministry of Civil Aviation met in New Delhi today. The subject of discussion was ‘Greening Airports’. The Minister of Civil Aviation Shri Jyotiraditya Scindia chaired the meeting which was attended by Hon’ble MPs, Minister of State for Civil Aviation (General) (Dr.) V.K. Singh (Retd.) and senior officials of the Ministry.

Briefing the members about the subject, Shri Scindia said that India’s Aviation sector has experienced rapid growth in recent years. He said that India has 148 operational airports including 137 airports, 2 water aerodromes and 9 heliports. The Ministry of Civil Aviation has taken initiatives to make airports carbon neutral and reach the target of net zero carbon emissions. The Minister said that to promote sustainable development in the aviation sector and reduce carbon emission at airports, Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) has organized Knowledge Sharing Sessions to standardize Carbon Accounting and Reporting framework of Indian airports as well as to make awareness on climate change mitigation. The Ministry has advised all operational brownfield airports and upcoming greenfield airports  to work towards achieving carbon neutrality and net zero which inter-alia includes use of 100 percent Green Energy. The State Governments have been advised to ensure carbon emission reduction measures. Further, Airports Economic Regulatory Authority has been advised to take into account the cost associated with the green energy use for airports tariff determination. The Ministry has also taken steps to encourage use of sustainable aviation fuel.

The Minister also spoke about initiatives taken for reduction of Green House Gases in air space which include Flexible Use of Airspace, Implementation of Central Air Traffic Flow Management, Implementation of Performance Based Navigation, and Implementation of Continuous Descent Operations. Shri Scindia said Delhi and Mumbai airports have achieved highest level 4+ carbon accreditation of ACI. Airport Authority of India (AAI)  has already installed solar power plants at various airports with cumulative capacity of more than 54 MWp as on date. Most of the Airports have been given the target of achieving 100 percent use of green energy by 2023 and net zero by 2030. He said that having more carbon neutrality airports in India will help the country in achieving its overall target of carbon neutrality/ net zero.

The Minister thanked Hon’ble MPs for their valuable suggestion in the meeting.

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YB

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