Government in Montijo fuel pipe demand

The Portuguese government is to demand that the airports management company ANA builds a fuel pipe as part of the Montijo airport project.

The measure was revealed by Alberto Souto de Miranda, Adjunct Secretary of State and of Communications in an interview with the online news source ECO.
This is because the project presented by ANA for Lisbon’s new secondary international airport does not feature the building of an infrastructure to ensure the “direct and independent fuelling of the airport.”
“The Government can now inform that it has already made this requirement known and will demand that the new Montijo airport should be fuelled by a direct pipeline”, said the minister when quizzed about the airport project which is currently going through public consultation.
The need for a second international airport for Lisbon is urgent as passenger numbers at the existing Humberto Delgado airport have swelled in recent years from 15 million in 2011 to a 30 million record in 2018.
The demand for an independent fuel supply has become acute since strikes by lorry drivers in April over pay and conditions and the threat of further strikes in the pipeline have revealed one of the weak points in the Portuguese economy.
Both Lisbon and Faro airports would run “dry” in less than 24 hours in a strike and faced with such a paralysing scenario fuel companies, the Government and ANA have decided to press ahead with the building of a fuel pipe to directly supply Lisbon airport.
But no such pipeline had been confirmed for the new airport at Montijo where fuel is “to be secured via a road tanker (30 m3), with up to 20 tankers per day. Three unloading “islands” are foreseen to receive these lorries” states Volume II of the Montijo Environmental Impact Study dedicated to the introduction paragraphs and project description.
“In a later phase the “possibility” of fuelling via a pipeline is foreseen” states the document which stops short of stating that this will become a mandatory requirement.