Why every airport needs Clarity in their environmental strategy

Next week we’re attending the International Airport Summit in Amsterdam. It looks set to be an exciting event and for me that’s especially so given we’ll be talking about something new, something we’re calling Clarity.

Clarity is a new tool we’re developing with the aim of helping airports to make clearer sustainability decisions. It will allow airports to analyse, visualise and compare the carbon impact of different aspects of their operation and to understand the relative effectiveness of future sustainability initiatives. This includes both the reduction in carbon emissions (and other greenhouse gases), and the costs of implementation.

Our aim is to support airports in having evidence-based conversations with their partners and stakeholders, to help them build consensus and accelerate progress towards emission reductions.

We know the industry is committed to tackling climate change and achieving net zero by 2050 and many airports are making good progress in decarbonising their ground operations and wider estate. But knowing which investments or initiatives are going to be the most effective, while at the same time understanding any potential impact on day-to-day operations is difficult. When big investments are being made, getting it right is important, both for the climate and for managing finite resources.

That’s why we all need Clarity.

As an airport, would you be best off investing in a new stand management system that will cut average aircraft taxi and waiting times, or installing fixed-electrical ground power? How much carbon would the introduction of time-based separation save vs ground vehicle electrification? These are the sort of difficult questions we want to help airports answer so they can build a strategy towards emission reductions that works for them and ensures they remain compliant with any relevant legislation.

The Clarity visualisation dashboard

Clarity – like GAIN, which I wrote about earlier this year – has been born out of our desire to work with the wider industry to accelerate our journey to net zero. We know that in the long term, most of that will need to come from new fuels and major technological advances, but there is still much we can be doing as an industry today.

For NATS, our sustainability journey started in 2008 when we introduced our own environmental programme. Since then, we’ve enabled a reduction of more than 10 million tonnes of CO₂ from UK airspace and were very proud to be named European Climate Leaders in 2024 by the Financial Times & Statista. It’s something we as a business and myself as an individual are very passionate about.

We’ll be meeting with leaders from across the industry next week to present our ideas and show the work we’ve done with Clarity so far. I hope those who share our vision will agree to work with us.

You can find out more about Clarity on our website, and if you’re attending the International Airport Summit on 13-14 November, it would be great to talk to you.