Heathrow airport is already the single largest emitter of carbon in the UK and a third runway would contribute an additional 6 million tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere every year.

A 3rd runway is simply not compatible with the climate emergency declared by Parliament in April, and the Government’s commitment to go carbon neutral by 2050.

The expansion plans are huge - it equates to bolting an airport the size of Gatwick onto Heathrow. The air pollution around the airport already exceeds legal limits - this expansion will only increase the amount of toxic air that we’re breathing. 

Heathrow is already Europe's most disruptive airport, impacting over 700,000 people with noise and an expansion could increase this to over 2 million thanks to 700 additional planes in the skies every day.

Heathrow also wants early growth even before planning permission is granted for a 3rd runway. They plan to introduce 25,000 extra flights a year (or 68 per day) by using an operational procedure known as Independent Parallel Approaches (IPA). This should be opposed unequivocally.

Local communities will also be destroyed, with hundreds of homes demolished and thousands more rendered uninhabitable in order to make way for the expansion.

Heathrow’s current consultation reveals that expansion will take over 30 years, inflicting construction blight and disruption to the major motorways as well as local roads and transport networks for decades.

The total cost of the expansion and the supporting infrastructure will be at least £31bn. We are in a climate emergency - this money should not be spent on a project that will destroy our environment and poison the air we breathe.

Help save future generations from climate catastrophe. Act now. It is not a done deal. Please sign the petition calling on the Government to stop the Heathrow expansion.

**The picture above is Airportraits by Mike Kelley - composed by combining a number of images of aircraft taking off from Heathrow**