Can We Get a Moratorium on Airport Expansions in the USA?

Stay Grounded is a climate movement founded in Europe that opposes airport expansion using civil disobedience methods. Does this sound familiar? They are colleagues of ours! If you're interested in getting involved in international direct action against aviation, join Stay Grounded's upcoming online trainings on November 25, December 2, and December 9, all from 12 pm to 2 pm Eastern time. It's highly recommended to attend all three workshops if possible. Some familiar XR Boston faces will facilitate parts of these trainings to provide an American perspective. Visit the Stay Grounded workshop site here for more information and to RSVP!

These trainings will allow activists from around the world to connect and share the similarities and differences in our parts of the climate movement. For example, we will discuss the possibility of fighting for moratoria on airport construction. A moratorium is a legal halt to construction that could be enforced by a nation, state, or city. While we haven't seen moratoria put into place yet, some airport constructions have been fully stopped, including a proposed new terminal in Paris's Roissy Airport in 2021 and the Indian AeroCity Shivdaspura in 2020. Additional runway construction has also been stalled at Heathrow Airport in the UK, Vienna Airport in Austria, and the Aeropuerto International de la Zona Sur in Costa Rica. This means that it's possible to win somewhere!

Right now, it's a challenging path in the United States to moratorium for airport expansion, but we have some legal precedent to draw on. Here in Massachusetts, we saw the Massport charter updated this year for the first time since its founding in 1956. This update included language about the promotion of “environmental protection and resilience, reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, and environmental justice principles as defined in section 62 of chapter 30 of the General Laws." This gives aviation opponents some leverage in our state!

It's more challenging at a national level, obviously. The Airport Noise and Capacity Act of 1990 phased out loud aircraft, which was an early step to acknowledging the impact of aviation on Americans' well-being. The Clean Air Act (CAA) technically regulates air emissions, but it’s currently at risk. In May, the Senate narrowly voted to overturn a critical Clean Air Act safeguard that protects public health from highly toxic air pollutants that cause cancer, birth defects, and brain damage.

The Senate passed legislation under the Congressional Review Act (CRA) to repeal the important U.S. Environmental Protection Agency rule which ensures that industrial facilities emitting the most toxic air pollution continue to meet Clean Air Act standards, which require reductions in that pollution. If it becomes law, the measure would allow nearly 2,000 polluting facilities to reduce their existing pollution controls and increase their emissions of the most highly toxic chemicals and cease monitoring and reporting on their releases of toxic air pollution into communities.  

What's currently under attack in the United States are basic laws that were intended to protect the immediate health of Americans from pollution, not even taking into account the necessary minimization of greenhouse gases in order to avert the worst of climate collapse. This points to a challenging road ahead for American aviation expansion opponents who intend to use the existing legal structures to pass moratorium laws. All this to say, we're in a moment for an aviation revolution. If you want to get connected to others around the world who are passionate about anti-aviation activism, sign up for the Stay Grounded workshop and we'll see you there.