Corporate Social Responsibility - Environmental Management - Carbon Reduction

According to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the aviation industry produces approximately 2% of the world's man-made emissions of carbon dioxide (CO₂), and 3% when non-CO₂ greenhouse gas emissions are considered. Airport operations contribute less than 5% of total aviation emissions.

Despite these relatively low figures, Hong Kong International Airport (HKIA) has developed a carbon reduction strategy to drive energy and fuel efficiency and further reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

In 2008, we signed the Aviation Industry Commitment to Action on Climate Change, a global initiative to mitigate our industry's impact on climate change. For details, please visit the Enviro.aero website.

The Airport Authority (AA) is also one of the founding members of the "Green Hong Kong · Carbon Audit" campaign organised by the Environmental Protection Department. In 2009, the AA and its business partners completed the first airport-wide carbon audit and have since worked together developing specific plans to reduce the airport's carbon footprints.

In 2010 the AA and its business partners pledged to reduce airport-wide carbon emissions by 25% per workload unit* by 2015 compared to 2008 levels. Since then, the airport community has completed more than 370 carbon reduction initiatives, including installing LEDs, improving building cooling systems and introducing more energy-efficient vehicles.

In 2013, HKIA received the Airport Carbon Accreditation "Optimisation" certificate from Airports Council International (ACI) in recognition of its carbon emissions management and reduction efforts. It is the second-highest level of accreditation in the programme and HKIA is the first airport in Asia Pacific to achieve this standard.

The AA actively promotes carbon reduction initiatives across the airport by organising technical visits, seminars and workshops for the airport community. More actions can be found at http://www.hongkongairport.com/eng/csr/carbon-reduction/index.html.

Our carbon reduction efforts earned us the Carbon "Less" 12% Certificate under the Hong Kong Awards for Environmental Excellence (HKAEE) in 2012 for all AA's facilities.

*One workload unit is equal to one passenger or 100kg of cargo.