In order to find a new balance between economic considerations and a healthy living environment, the Dutch government attempts to limit capacity at Schiphol Airport. Three ‘tracks’ are devised to effectuate its decision designed to reduce capacity, with the first two exclusively related to noise-related restrictions on the number of aircraft movements. Introducing such noise-related operating restrictions at airports requires a ‘Balanced Approach (BA) to aircraft noise management’, as international and European law prescribes. Both tracks pursued by the government of the Netherlands are heavily disputed for not complying with the international BA principle and the BA Regulation of the European Union (EU). In the 1.5 years since the initial announcement, the Dutch approach to the BA has gained much international attention, and developments have followed one another in quick succession.
This article attempts to provide a comprehensive overview of the developments that have been and are taking place and to put the BA in a broader, international context. The article will first study the BA concept and conditions at the international level (section 2) and how these have been transposed in and supplemented by the noise regime under EU law (section 3). The way the BA procedure in the present case is being conducted in the Netherlands and the results that have been notified to the EU Commission are then analysed against this background (section 4). While the EU Commission reviews the Dutch BA procedure, and questions about its enforcement powers arise, the last part places noise-related operating restrictions in the broader context of the EU internal air transport market (section 5) and international obligations vis-à-vis third States (section 6).