Creation of a Global Framework for ESG Reporting Provides Airports With the Right Tool for Success

Airports face the ongoing challenge of investing in infrastructure to meet future air travel demand, while also ensuring any new developments are designed, constructed, and operated in an economically sustainable, inclusive, socially and environmentally responsible way.

Airports Council International (ACI) World announces that global aviation consultancies and leaders in sustainable aviation, NACO (Netherlands Airport Consultants), a company of Royal HaskoningDHV, and To70, have been selected to lead the creation of a global standardized framework for improved airport environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) reporting.

The creation of a global framework for ESG will build on the ACI World ESG Management Best Practice and the work of various ACI regions, and represents a further focus on ESG reporting in the industry. It also supports the ACI Airport Carbon Accreditation program, the only institutionally endorsed, global carbon management certification program for airports.  The global framework for ESG aims to give airports an institutional framework for governance, compliance, and stewardship, taking into account different legal and regulatory requirements from country to country and region to region.

Luis Felipe de Oliveira, Director General at ACI World, said: “This project offers airports a useful tool as they consider ESG reporting. We are happy to have trusted industry experts working on the consolidation and synthesis of reporting mechanisms used across regions who will, with the support of our members and key actors in the finance community, develop a comprehensive, enduring framework for the sector.”

Esther Kromhout, Director at NACO, expressed the consultancy’s excitement at being appointed: “ESG has rightly become a key agenda item for airports and institutions around the world. We’re proud to have been appointed to lead the development of this framework, which will give all airports the guidance they need to implement, review, and monitor ESG meaningfully within their operations.”

Ruud Ummels, Director at To70, spoke about the role they will play: “Airport decarbonisation must be tackled in synergy with leading ESG frameworks. By building bridges between carbon reduction roadmaps and an airport specific standard for ESG reporting, we will assure airports can obtain the green investments needed to reach Net Zero Carbon by 2050 or before.”

For the second phase of the project, the NACO and To70 team will develop an ESG framework for Hamad International Airport and Kigali International Airport. This will serve as a pilot and further refinement of the ESG Global Framework before it is released for wider application.