Representation by Barry Guy
- Date submitted
- 21 June 2023
- Submitted by
- Members of the public/businesses
I object to the proposal on the grounds it will have a detrimental effect on health due to the increased noise levels. The proposal dishonestly claims no significant increase in night time flights by defining a shorter night. Even if no flights were to occur with in the newly defined night period and we already know this is not the case, the period is less than the recommended healthy minimum sleep requirement. To then say the identified adverse affect on well being is offset by the benefit to health and well-being that will occur from the increase in operational employment opportunities is unacceptable. This is basically stating that it is OK for retired pensioners like myself to suffer significant detriment to our health from lack of sleep because some other people will be better off as a result of having a job. To make matters worse the noise assessment on which any mitigation packages would be offered appears to be based on an average over time noise level. However, it is clearly the peak noise level that disturbs one’s sleep. Aircraft do not arrive or depart uniformly over time. There are periods with no aircraft noise followed by a succession of aircraft arriving every two minutes. The airport has a proven track record of not complying with limits set by earlier planning consents. As Luton Council are the direct beneficiaries of the airport, they appear to be reluctant to compromise their own financial position by enforcing their own limits. I object to the proposal on the grounds of its adverse impact on the climate. The proposal fully accepts that climate change is occurring as the design includes measures to accommodate or mitigate the predicted effects. Having accepted the effects of climate change it is therefore rather perverse to come forward with proposals that will aggravate the situation. While it claims that such effects will be mitigated by improvements in aircraft design it makes completely unsupportable claims as to when such aircraft will be available. A simple Google search for Hydrogen powered flight gives some very useful information including the fact that commercial deployment is at least 20 years away. There will be a decades long development program required to develop the necessary materials for a Hydrogen burning engine, to design the engine itself and to adapt aircraft design to accommodate such engines and the liquid Hydrogen fuel. It will also take time to construct the infrastructure to produce, store and distribute liquid Hydrogen in the quantities required. Even when available it will take a long time to replace the existing fleet of aircraft as carriers will not simply scrape perfectly serviceable aircraft. Any increase in passenger numbers should be conditional on the adoption of such technology and there must be meaningful control measures in place as the airport has already demonstrated that it does not honour promises it has given. I object to the proposal on the grounds that the economic case is not justified and the consequences of failure for Luton Council would be catastrophic leaving local council tax payers saddled with an enormous debt and even worse local services. The viability of the proposed airport expansion is dependent on the accuracy of the predicted passenger numbers. I do not believe the projections are supportable as they have not taken adequate account of the effect of 1) Brexit, 2) the cost-of-living crisis, 3) the public's changing attitude towards climate change and the acceptability of flying and 4) the move away from expensive business meetings and associated flights to on-line communicating.