Environment

Kiruna Airport’s mission is to meet the needs of residents and businesses in the region for flights and goods transport.

Kiruna Airport works in a number of areas to minimise the negative environmental impact of its operations, mainly be reducing carbon dioxide emissions, reducing other atmospheric emissions and discharges to water, and minimising the use of chemicals and the generation of waste.

In order to achieve this, it requires that we work based on the following fundamental rules:

• Concern for the environment shall be an integral part of all operations and be a factor in all decisions.
• Climate change is the most important environmental issue for the aviation industry and shall be given priority in all decisions and activities.
• We shall continually make operations more energy-efficient and guide operations towards sustainable resource use.
• We shall purchase energy-efficient products and services and encourage construction that leads to better energy performance.
• All of Swedavia’s employees shall take part in the company’s environmental and energy work.
• We shall systematically assess and manage environmental risks and energy performance.

Swedavia shall participate actively in local, regional, national and international efforts in order to reduce the negative environmental impact from aviation and work for the sustainable development of the airports.

Our zero vision

In 2020, Swedavia reached its goal of zero fossil carbon dioxide emissions from its own airport operations.

There is extensive work behind our success in achieving zero fossil carbon dioxide emissions. We purchase green electricity for all of our operations, our uninterruptible power supply runs on hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO), our vehicle fleet runs on HVO, fossil-free gas or green electricity, and we purchase biogasol and biogas.

Read more about our work with our zero emissions goal, what else we do and what you can do to contribute to aviation’s transition to net zero operations.

Expanded climate work

All of Swedavia’s airports are accredited at the ACA 3+ level in accordance with Airport Council International (ACI) Europe’s standards for the climate work of airports. That means our airports continuously reduce fossil carbon dioxide emissions from their own operations, offset the emissions that have not yet been reduced and help other businesses operating at the airports to reduce their emissions. At the end of 2020, we achieved our goal of zero fossil carbon dioxide emissions for the airport operations run under our own management. 

The next goal is to have all the airports accredited at the ACA 4+ level, which means that agents for de-icing runways/aircraft and coolants will be included in the measurements. We shall also work to a greater extent to engage and work together with other companies and organisations that have significant carbon dioxide emissions at the airports in order to continue reducing emissions together. Over time, all the operations at our airports will switch to renewable energy sources. This work is in line with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s goal not to exceed a 1.5 C degree rise in global warming as well as Swedavia’s strategy and goals for proactive climate change adaptation.

You can read more about the programme here.

In late 2013, the environmental permit process for Kiruna Airport began. An application was submitted to the Land and Environmental Court at the Umeå District Court in October 2015. The main hearing was held in September 2016, and the Court issued its ruling in November 2016. The permit entered into force on January 1, 2017.

Land and Environmental Court’s ruling, PDF (in Swedish)

The report must be sent to the regulatory authority by March 31 of the following year. Operations at Kiruna Airport are subject to an environmental permit, and the airport submits its report to the Norrbotten County Administrative Board, which has in turn delegated regulatory oversight to the Municipality of Kiruna.

Environmental report 2021, PDF (in Swedish)