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The U.K.’s Supreme Court today overturned a February ruling barring Heathrow Airport from building a third runway.
The new ruling allows Heathrow to seek new planning permission for the infrastructure. It remains unclear if that consent will be granted by the British government, which has committed to achieving net zero emissions by 2050 and cutting carbon emissions by 68 percent by 2030.
In a statement, a Heathrow spokesperson said the runway ruling would allow “Britain as a sovereign nation to compete for trade and win against our rivals in France and Germany.”
Magdalena Heuwieser, a climate activist with the Stay Grounded campaign, condemned the “reckless and irresponsible verdict” and vowed to keep up the fight against the runway, which she said amounted to “a betrayal of our children’s future.”
The Supreme Court’s ruling overturned a decision by the Court of Appeal of the High Court of England and Wales, which in February said the 2018 runway project did not take sufficient account of the U.K.’s climate change pledges under the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement.
At the time Prime Minister Boris Johnson — historically a public opponent of the £14 billion runway project, since voters in his constituency would be heavily affected by the airport expansion — confirmed that his government would not challenge the decision, but Heathrow appealed the ruling.
Heathrow handled 80.8 million passengers in 2019. However, the COVID-19 pandemic is likely to have a lasting impact on airline traffic rates. The new runway aspired to allow 700 additional planes to land at the airport each day.
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