Support of Cost-Benefit Analyses of Noise Control Measures Around a Generic Airport

Abstract

Airframe manufacturers predict that air transport, expressed in revenue passenger kilometers, is increasing constantly with nearly 5% (worldwide average) per year the next decades. Along with this growth also the environmental problems of this kind of transportation will aggravate such as pollutant and noise emission. Especially the airport surrounding neighborhoods are negatively affected by these issues. Concerning aircraft noise, some principles and methods to improve the ecological situation around airports have been developed according to the ICAO balanced approach and in some promising cases even have been implemented at noise-sensitive airports. Short to-medium term measures are the application of vertical noise abatement procedures (approach and departure) and operational restrictions (curfew, quota, budget). Out of them, this study focuses on the economic advantages of some selected procedures based on their noise emissions (single and multiple events) taking into account the level at defined points and the affected contour. Considering actual noise-dependent landing fee models of various airports and social costs of aircraft it researches the impact of wide-body aircraft (A340, B747) flying low noise approaches and departures in a complete airport scenario on the resulting costs. Therefore landing fees and the total annual, aircraft specific and marginal costs of the emitted noise using different valuation modes such as the Hedonic House Price Method or an approach according to the European proposal on common noise-dependent landing fees will be estimated. The corresponding noise simulations are done for a generic airport based on the layout and the population distribution of Frankfurt airport. The flight mix is linked to the real Frankfurt flight route usage and the Airbus Global Market Forecast. Current situations are researched as well as realistic future scenarios for the years 2012 and 2022. The results have been compared and validated as far as possible with data provided by German airport authorities and recent noise valuation studies from other parties.