Greening Up

The concept of sustainability broadens for the world’s airlines, airports and hotels.

- Bob Curley

ZERO-EMISSION, ELECTRICALLY powered commercial aircraft are still mostly sketches on the drawing board, but in many other ways the green future already arrived as travelers pass through the world’s airports, travel the world’s airlines and move between hotels where sustainability is no longer viewed as a novelty but as an economic necessity.

“It’s the aviation industry that is leading this effort for the built environment,” says Pat Askew, principal and aviation director, HKS, an architectural firm which designs airports around the world, including the ongoing renovation of Terminal 1 at San Francisco International Airport. “Every airport terminal is being designed now to be environmentally conscious and responsible.”

Travelers might expect the Galápagos Ecological Airport, built in 2012, to be eco-friendly, and indeed the gateway to the abundant but fragile wildlife and natural beauty of the Galápagos Islands gets all its power from solar and wind energy sources. But it’s just one of 44 airports worldwide achieving carbon-neutral status, according to the 2017–2018 annual report from Airport Council International’s Airport Carbon Accreditation program.

Of these, Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport represents the only fully carbon-neutral airport in the United States: The world’s fourth-busiest airport reduced its carbon emissions by 29 percent 2010– 2017 and cut its energy use by 38 percent, despite a 15 percent increase in the number of passengers in the same period.