Heathrow, Schiphol, Charles de Gaulle: European airports rank amongst the world’s most polluting

New research has revealed the climate and air quality impacts of the world’s worst polluting airports.

The 2024 Airport Tracker, produced by think tank ODI in partnership with Transport & Environment, measures the impact of passenger flights and, for the first time, air freight.

It found that Dubai International was overall the most polluting airport, producing the same emissions as five coal plants in 2019 alone, the last year for which data is available.

In Europe, Frankfurt, Paris Charles de Gaulle and Amsterdam Schiphol all rank among the world’s worst 20 performing airports.

London was the city most affected by air pollution from aviation. Its six airports generated the same amount of air pollution as 3.23 million cars, producing 27 million tonnes of CO2, 8,900 tonnes of nitrogen oxide (NOx) and 83 tonnes of fine particulate pollution (PM2.5).

Globally, air pollution is the 4th largest risk factor for human health, killing 6.7 million people in 2019. In 2018, air pollution had associated economic costs of £166 billion (€193 billion) for the European economy.

“Aircraft noise levels are continuously exceeded, and we completely lack EU standards on ultrafine particles, which are a major health hazard,” says Magdalena Heuwieser, press officer at Stay Grounded.

“Some key measures must be taken immediately to protect the health of workers and communities surrounding airports – like night flight bans or simple jet fuel improvements to have at least the same standards as car fuel."

Some European countries, like France and Spain, are trying to encourage citizens to take trains instead of planes for short journeys.

The 2024 Airport Tracker covers the emissions of NOx and PM2.5 from 1,300 airports, updating on research first published