25 signatures reached
To: The UK government
Stop expansion of aviation until carbon emissions are zero
This petition asks the UK Government to change the CAA's rules on airspace change to:
1) prevent any airspace change that will increase the number of departures or arrivals from an airport;
2) Impose a strict curfew - excepting emergencies - such that aircraft which are noisy enough to cause sleep disturbance within one kilometer are not permitted to take off between the hours of 22:00 and 07:00, allowing the widely recommended sleep period of eight hours.
Why is this important?
Edinburgh Airport recently submitted a new attempt to more than double the number of flights per hour by changing the airspace rules aircraft depart and arrive under.
https://airspacechange.caa.co.uk/PublicProposalArea?pID=163
This is detrimental to the local environment in other ways too. With no limits on night flights, local residents may find themselves woken early or suffering sleep disturbance.
The scientific evidence is now beyond challenge. Burning fossil fuels is causing a rise in global temperatures which threatens the survival of many species, and many humans as well.
Edinburgh's proposal would take their peak departure rate from about 20 per hour, to about 50, representing 6,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide emission per departure hour. Assuming 12 hours equivalent per day that's 26 million tonnes of emissions per year from increased flights from Edinburgh.
At a time when the world has realised we must take dramatic action to reduce carbon emissions to zero as quickly as possible, airport expansion is the wrong thing to do.
Lack of sleep has been shown to speed up aging and cause psychiatric and physical illnesses. (See Martin Walker, amongst others.)
