Bali to Build Airport Offshore

Bali is an island located 3.2 km East of Java and is approximately 8 degrees south of the equator. Home to central mountains with peaks over 2000 metres with an active volcano that just erupt back in 2017, resulting in airport closure and a decrease in tourism. I Gusti Ngurah Rai International Airport is the main airport in Bali, located 13 km south of the city Denpasar. Ngurah Rai is the second busiest airport in Indonesia after Soekarno-Hatta International Airport, Jakarta.

Bali is a fast growing tourist destination with about 12-15% passenger growth annually. The airport reached 20 million passengers per annum in 2017 which is the full capacity of the airport. The new terminals in Bali have been operating since September 17, 2014. The new domestic terminal area is 65,800 square meter which is 4 times larger than the old one. This too the building were incapable to support the fast growth Bali is experiencing.

The government need to build a new airport soon, due to the geographical location of the current airport, it can no longer expand. The current airport sits between populated areas.

A potential location of the new airport has been found in the northern part of Bali, located in Singaraja, about 19 km to the east of Buleleng Regency. The area is surrounded by mountains which is dangerous for approach and departure. So it is best to build the airport offshore. The concept of the new airport will be equipped with the standard technology of ZEA (Zero Energy Airport).

The airport will be covered on a 28 square kilometre land area. It is planned to build the airport with 2 runways, each being 7000 meters in length. It is expected to have a capacity of 32 million passengers per annum. This airport will have the technology of refining sea water into clean water worth consumption.

This technology other than to meet the needs of the airport, it will also be distributed to the fishermen and the surrounding population. The airport will be built with the concept of airport city which will contain sporting areas, shopping malls, theatre and an artificial lake.

The other reason of why they are planning to build the new airport so far from the current popular tourist area is that, the northern part of Bali doesn't get that much of tourist's attention, the distance between South Bali (Which is a popular tourist location) to the Northern part of Bali is approximately 60 kilometres. With the new airport being built in the northern part of Bali, this should boost tourism in those areas.