Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport has bought out a number of cattle farms near the airport as part of a strategy to control nitrogen emissions and allow the airport to avoid a more than 10% cutback in allowed flights.
The airport was faced with a government order to cut the number of yearly flights from 500,000 to 440,000, largely because of nitrogen emissions. The airport hopes that by shutting down the nitrogen-producing cattle farms, it will be able to avoid the flight cuts. It’s unclear whether the land will be left unused, or will be put to other agricultural use that produces less nitrogen.
The airport operator also bought some cattle land near the Lelystad Airport, which it also operates. Lelystad has been proposed as a more active secondary airport for Schiphol, but also has nitrogen issues.
