Spatiotemporal Emission Characteristics and Driving Factors of Air Pollutants and CO2 from Aircraft at Airports: A Case Study in China

With the rapid expansion of China’s civil aviation industry, airport aircraft emissions have raised growing environmental concerns, making it imperative to clarify their emission characteristics and driving mechanisms. In this study, 10 major civil aviation airports in Shandong Province, a highly representative airport cluster in China, were selected to investigate the characteristics of aviation emissions using actual flight activity data from 2023. Our results show that the total emissions of HC, CO, NOx, SO2, PM, and CO2 from the airport aircraft were 144.6, 1890.4, 2571.8, 358.7, 18.2, and 584,822 tons, respectively, with NOx and CO being the dominant air pollutants. The taxiing phase was identified as the largest contributor to total emissions, and the B737-800 emerged as the largest emission-contributing aircraft type. Moreover, our results reveal that airport aircraft emissions exhibited spatiotemporal heterogeneity. These emissions peaked in July and August, but displayed low levels during wintertime. Spatially, these aviation emissions were predominantly concentrated in eastern Shandong Province, and Qingdao and Jinan cities were the top two contributors, jointly contributing more than 66% of the total emissions. This study further indicates that this spatiotemporal heterogeneity was primarily attributed to air passenger throughput, aircraft movements, and GDP. Our findings can be extended to other provinces in China and provide a scientific basis for the future mitigation of aviation emissions at airports across China.