SOUTHEND airport’s mission to be green has seen it recycling rainwater, harnessing power from solar panels and drastically lowering emissions from planes.

The airport is working with Southend Council with an environmental management plan, after it declared a climate emergency in 2019.

Since 2015, none of the waste generated at the site has been sent to landfill, and it tries to recycle as much water as possible.

In the airport’s annual report for the year, it said: “Two 60,000 litre underground water reservoirs hold rainwater collected from the new terminal roof for use on-site.

“The harvested water is fed through a series of filters in a Stormsaver rainwater recovery system, making it suitable for use on-site including for flushing toilets.”

Emissions from the airport's base operations dropped by 36 per cent as part of its plan to become carbon neutral.

It is also striving to have more power coming from renewable sources, including almost 500 solar panels on its terminal roof, and almost 10,000 solar panels in its solar farm.

Kevin Buck, shadow councillor in charge of transport, said: “The airport should be applauded for the efforts they are making around environmental emissions, that’s a good news story for their perspective and our perspective.

“We may aspire to be completely zero emissions for everything, but in the short term that’s not going to be possible for the aviation industry.

“But they should be applauded for their efforts.”

The airport in 2019 introduced a “pour away sink” feature, encouraging passengers to empty liquids in their water bottles before going through security, to allow the bottles to be reused to prevent plastic going to waste.

Southend Airport recorded 4,724 carbon dioxide emissions per unit revenue in 2019, down from 5,133 the previous year.

From 2019 to 2020, there were 13,406,719 kilowatt hours of electricity consumed, and 17 per cent of this came from renewable energy sources.

A spokesman for Southend Airport said: “We were pleased to have shared our recent carbon accreditation and commitments to move to net zero carbon emissions.

“However, we are also conscious that carbon locally and nationally hasn’t reduced significantly despite airports across the UK having operated near zero flights for almost a year.

“This suggests to us that there needs to be wider thinking when it comes to reducing carbon emission beyond targeting aviation, and we are keen to play our part.

“Aviation continues to face challenges as a result of the pandemic and we thank our many supporters during this difficult time.”