A Hong Kong airport fourth runway may be good for business, but it would be terrible for the environment

Paul Stapleton says the discussion surrounding a fourth runway for the city’s airport has ignored the high carbon footprint of air transport

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A passenger looks at aircraft at Terminal 2 of the Hong Kong International Airport in Chek Lap Kok on May 27. The city is constructing a third runway to cope with increasing air traffic, and there have been suggestions that it needs a fourth. Photo: Roy Issa

Published: 6:01am, 30 Jun 2018Updated: 6:05pm, 30 Jun 2018

“If you build it, they will come.” That was the line quoted by Kevin Costner’s character in the 1989 movie, Field of Dreams. The sentence has now entered the popular vernacular to roughly mean, if you build something, it can create its own demand.

And, although everyone knows this message doesn’t always pan out, which is why we have the term “white elephant”, it most certainly does apply in the case of the recent discussion about Hong Kong International Airport’s potential fourth runway.

This talk of a fourth runway is now starting to appear in the news before landfill from the third runway has even emerged above sea level. But the fact that the fourth runway has entered the discussion, although mostly to cast doubt on its need, is a telling statement of our times. Economic growth will always triumph over planetary health.

This casting of doubt on the need for a fourth runway actually requires some doubt cast upon itself. The move of Hong Kong’s airport from Kai Tak 20 years ago was expressly because that locale, with its one runway, had reached its capacity. At the time, Chek Lap Kok’s two new runways were viewed as more than sufficient. Twenty years later, both runways have now reached capacity, thus the need for yet another one.

Clearly, we are witnessing a pattern here: when runways reach their capacity, build a new one.

Further, world air traffic is projected to nearly double between now and 2036, growing from 4 billion to close to 8 billion passengers. And, given that this increase will be most intense in the Asia-Pacific region, a fourth runway, despite the scepticism, is all but inevitable.