Government begins proceedings with ANA to speed up new airport process
Portugal’s Ministry of Infrastructures has begun taking steps with the airports management concession holder ANA – Aeroportos de Portugal to speed up the process to build the future new Luís de Camões International Airport at Alcochete.
The steps will include making the timeframe foreseen in the contract more flexible with the aim to bring forward the application from ANA to manage the new airport according to sources reported by the online news source ECO.
The concession contract stipulates that it falls to the concession authority, the State, to inform the concession holder that it should produce a high-level assumption report on airport capacity development for Lisbon.
ANA has now got 6 months to produce the report that could be decisive for the process to move forward. In addition to the proposed location 42 km from Lisbon, the report should include an estimate of preliminary costs and key specifications, how long the airport will take to build, a completion date, and how much it will cost to build the new airport.
The latter should include proposals for an eventual change in the airport tax regime and/or an extension on the concession period.
After receiving this initial report, the government would have 30 days to “send a letter to the concession holder (ANA) asking it if it wants to prepare a tender to manage the new airport”.
If ANA intends to apply for the concession, it will then have 36 months to present its application, a process that would imply even more documents such as a consolations report, a location or site report, an environmental impact study, a technical report, and a financial report. The ministry wants to reduce the time it would potentially take for all these reports to be readied to enable construction works to begin earlier.
The Minister of Infrastructures and Housing, Miguel Pinto Luz has suggested 2034 as a reasonable date for the new Luís de Camões Airport to become operational.
