From June, Brindisi Airport will be equipped with the first Italian digital control tower, thus taking the Apulian airport into the future with the latest air traffic control technology. How do you view the arrival of this new form of operation?

I am convinced that the choice of Salento airport as the first to be equipped with the Remote Tower is an excellent starting point on our way to achieving the great challenge that awaits us: the future. And in Puglia, a region I consider to be one step ahead, the future is now. And proof of this can be seen in the many advances made by Aeroporti di Puglia especially in terms of growth and infrastructural enhancement. Over and above our pride in Brindisi airport having the first Italian digital control tower, I can firmly say that Salento airport is ready for any challenge. The next one is successfully concluding the 2022 summer season with percentages that reach or even surpass those recorded before the pandemic and so far the numbers are looking good.

What does this technological installation mean for the Aeroporti di Puglia and how will it change the way of working between the Management Company of which you are Chairman and our Air Traffic Controllers operating at the Apulian airport?

As regards Aeroporti di Puglia, there will be absolutely no change with respect to the excellent cooperation that has always distinguished the existing relationships with ENAV, both locally and centrally. As far as the infrastructure is concerned, the inauguration of the Remote Tower represents a further leap ahead in terms of quality and the already excellent service standards of a fundamental and strategic infrastructure for the regional airport network and more generally for the national airport system. Today, digital innovation, a fundamental lever for our country’s growth, has allowed Brindisi to rightfully become a hub from which the control towers and main activities of other airports will be managed remotely. This is an important step along the road towards a more efficient and modern air traffic control system, which represents a real revolution for the skies over Europe.

Digitisation and sustainability are important pillars for the future of ENAV. What initiatives and projects, in the same vein, has Aeroporti di Puglia implemented?

From an infrastructural point of view, the main actions on environmental sustainability promoted by AdP have concerned the improved efficiency of the AGL (Aeronautical Ground Lighting) systems serving the Flight infrastructures at the airports of Bari and Brindisi; the improved energy efficiency programme at Bari airport; environmental mitigation actions through the implementation of green areas in the airports of Bari and Brindisi; the construction of photovoltaic plants for the production of electricity from renewable sources and the construction of a biomass cogeneration plant capable of generating heat and electricity from renewable sources. With a view to ‘Sustainability 4.0’, Aeroporti di Puglia has, amongst other things, modernised, within the scope of the OT systems, its BHS system serving the airports of Bari and Brindisi and also modernised and enhanced the efficiency of the land side and air side electrical systems serving its four airports (Bari, Brindisi, Foggia and Grottaglie).

What challenges await the Taranto-Grottaglie airport on the drone front where d-flight (a company in the ENAV Group) is at the forefront with other Italian companies?

Grottaglie airport is Italy’s strategic infrastructure for autonomous access to Space and for the development of “unmanned” technologies, where industrial research and experimental development projects are conducted together with other institutional and industrial partners. This is to support the needs of standardisation and regulation in the management of drone traffic, based on the results of flight tests and simulation programmes conducted in Grottaglie, with a view to integration between Airports and Air Navigation Service Providers, in order to allow the safe introduction of drones into unsegregated airspace, bearing in mind that in the context of the Single European Sky it is estimated that in 2035 there will be over 7 million drones in the European skies.