Modelling framework for evaluation environmental strategy and water management efficency at airports

The growing concern about climate change and environmental protection represent significant barriers towards growth in the aviation sector. Currently, airport operators need to consider not only noise control and local air, soil and water pollution management, but also to control the consumption of nonrenewable natural resources and to minimise their impact on climate change. A detailed analysis of current applied practices pointed out that the main issues that airports need to manage, have to do principally with control of natural resources consumption, control of noise and management of emissions, water quality, waste and ecosystems. Although these issues in most of cases have been identified, airports’ priorities regarding their management were not easily acknowledged. The key findings of this research suggest that in the case of environmental management strategies, different patterns exist; thus, some airports seem to seek balance mostly between mitigating global and local environmental issues or resource consumption control and pollution management, while others obviously take measures aimed at managing one or the other impact. In the case of water management efficiency, while many airports seem to have applied measures to sustain water quality, only a few of them have applied sufficient consumption control measures.