Schiphol Airport would like to excuse itself from the hop-on, hop-off jet-setting culture of business tycoons, celebrities and sports stars. The effort, if it succeeds over industry opposition, could set a precedent for private aviation around the world.
“This statement was really out of the blue; we didn’t expect it,” said Michael van Hooff, owner of Amsterdam-based Orange Jets, a private jet charter broker that operated 600 flights from Schiphol Airport last year. Rotterdam The Hague Airport, which is also owned by Royal Schiphol Group, was quick to clarify that it has no capacity to take on flights from the Amsterdam hub. A Schiphol Group spokesperson said that the company doesn’t intend to transfer all traffic to one of its other airports, and is instead proposing greater use of commercial flights and/or other business destinations in Europe.
In Europe, the number of flights increased 64 percent last year, leading to an almost-doubling of CO2 emissions, according to a separate study conducted by Dutch environmental consultancy CE Delft and commissioned by Greenpeace. Last year, French Transport Minister Clément Beaune said the country was looking into a tax on private flights, or using other means to get companies and rich individuals to limit their use.
The protest clearly played a role in Schiphol’s current plan, says Greenpeace climate and energy campaigner Maarten de Zeeuw, though he also acknowledged that local frustration has been building for some time. “Maybe the airlines don’t see it yet, but in the end it’s inevitable that there are measures that reduce noice and pollution,” De Zeeuw said.