Highlands and Islands Airports: Weathering climate change challenges
Highlands and Islands Airports: Weathering climate change challenges
Highlands and Islands Airports Limited (HIAL) is responsible for 11 regional airports serving some of Scotland’s remotest communities across the Highlands and Islands.
Ricardo worked with HIAL to produce their most recent Climate Change Adaptation Report, alongside HIAL’s climate mitigation strategy, a climate vulnerability and risk assessment (VRA) of HIAL’s operations, infrastructure, and strategic functions undertaken in February to May 2023.
Challenge
Across the globe the aviation industry is highly sensitive to climate-related hazards and resultant climate vulnerabilities and risks have the potential to cause severe disruption to airport operations, delays for passengers, and ultimately, reductions in the safety of aircraft.
The most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) assessment report states that countries nationally determined contributions (NDCs) make it likely that warming will exceed 1.5°C during the 21st century, with every additional increment of global warming increasing the severity of extreme events. Previously, the latest UK climate projections suggested that even under a stringent greenhouse gas emissions reduction scenario, a degree of physical climate risk is now scientifically inevitable.
HIAL’s airports provide a lifeline service to individuals, communities and businesses across Scotland’s Highlands and Islands, and it is essential for HIAL to ensure that its operations, infrastructure, and strategic functions are resilient to climate variability and change.
Our approach
- Establish a climate baseline
- Establish future climate projections
- Airport vulnerability and risk assessment
- Climate change risk assessment and adaptation actions
The Vulnerability and Risk Assessment (VRA) systematically establishes and interacts ratings of the components of climate risks in accordance with the IPCC’s definitions of terms. First, climate sensitivities and associated adaptive capacities were rated in order to rate climate vulnerabilities. The magnitude and frequency of exposure of climate vulnerabilities to climate-related hazards was then rated to determine the scale of potential climate impacts and in combination with their likelihood resulted in ratings of climate risks.
Ricardo held two workshops with airport managers from each of HIAL’s regional airports and key HIAL staff to identify and rate climate vulnerabilities, risks and adaptation options. The latter adaptation options were additional to relevant existing control measures or strategies that can mitigate climate risks.
Results
In order to ensure that HIAL’s climate change adaptation response remains appropriate and effective the following next steps have been identified:
- Responsibilities are assigned for all identified climate risks, which should be incorporated into HIAL airports’ existing risk registers
- The climate risk register is reviewed annually to check that the existing and future control measures (i.e., adaptation actions) are implemented, the climate risks are regularly reassessed and any additional climate risks are included in the register
- The annual review of climate risks pays due heed to the latest climate science to ensure that existing and future control measures are appropriate
- External stakeholders to the airport and aviation industry continue to be consulted to share best practices regarding climate risk assessment, adaptation, and resilience.
This summary report is complemented by a supplementary excel document detailing individual regional airport risks following the standard DEFRA airport climate change risk template.
You can find the full report here
Speak with our airports and aviation specialists by emailing: enquiry-ee@ricardo.com
