Decarbonated Airport Regions
Airports are increasingly vital to the prosperity of regions. They are no longer just part of the economy, but are instead increasingly defining regional economic ecosystems. However, the growing economic importance and growth of airports needs to be balanced against adverse environmental impacts as emissions from civil aviation have increased significantly in the last decades. Besides, it is forecasted that air traffic will more than double by 2020. Therefore, a lack of appropriate ecological measures now, will only lead to even greater emissions of greenhouse gases from aviation and the surface transport linked to it.

D-AIR largely contributes to converting airports into ecological sustainable transport hubs. It deals with 2 main elements of airport operations that can fall in the competence of public authorities and public bodies: surface accessibility to airport zones and CO2 neutrality of airport operator activities, respectively, the 2 main project sub-themes. The project
pays special attention to the optimal involvement of business and R&D communities in creating well connected green airports, by contributing to new innovative products and services needed to realize prompt actions on the ground.  

Exchange of experience will be carried out in the form of study visits, with each partner region hosting peer review workshops along the sub-themes, based on detailed start-position analyses. Study visit findings will be collected in study visit reports that will be elaborated into regional implementation plans with concrete actions and financial schemes, to be endorsed by each region’s decision-makers. The outcome of this study visit process will be synthesised in transnational best-of documents, along the sub-themes of CO2 neutrality and transport links. These documents will include concrete policy recommendations, to be widely disseminated to other airport regions and interested parties within and beyond the D-AIR partnership.
D-AIR unites 10 regions with 14 partner organisations, all having clear ambitions to significantly reduce CO2 emissions linked to airport operations: Eindhoven (NL), Terres de France (FR), Stockholm (SE), Leipzig (DE), Vienna (AT), Bologna (IT), El Prat de Llobregat (ES), Malta (MT), Mazovia (PL), Prague (CZ). The consortium is completed with ARC, a European network uniting airport regions. All of the D-AIR partners are well aware of the need to find the optimal balance between economic growth of their airports and environmental sustainability, which, if properly carried out, significantly contributes to the sustainable development of Europe's urban environments.