THE boss of one of the world’s largest and fastest-growing airlines has backed plans for a new airport in the Thames estuary so Britain can compete with foreign rivals threatening to eclipse Heathrow.

Tim Clark, president of Emirates, Dubai’s national airline, said building the new international hub at sea would enable both Heathrow and Gatwick to close, providing land for development and bringing environmental benefits across southeast England.

Clark, the first main air chief to back the estuary scheme publicly, said it was necessary because the long-term development of Heathrow was “severely compromised”. “ There is no room for growth. European and Middle Eastern hubs will eventually eclipse [Heathrow],” said Clark, who is British and began his career with the British Caledonian airline. “A new airport in the Thames estuary would tick all the boxes in terms of growth and the environment, and would be funded by the sale of Heathrow for property development. An estuary site could also mean there would be no requirement to keep Gatwick open as it is only 40 miles from the new airport,” he said.

Support from Emirates will be particularly significant for the estuary project, which already has the backing of Boris Johnson, the London mayor.

While other airlines are retrenching, Emirates plans to take delivery of 245 new aircraft in the next decade. The billions being ploughed by Dubai into its infrastructure constitute one of the greatest threats to Heathrow’s current leadership in international air travel.

In a fortnight, a terminal twice the size of Heathrow’s terminal 5 will open. The emirate has also started work on a new airport which, with six planned runways, will dwarf Heathrow. Al-Maktoum International, which will be fully operational in 2017, will be capable of handling 150m passengers a year, compared with Heathrow’s 68m.

Supporters of the estuary project in Britain say Dubai’s plans sharpen the need to consider a replacement for Heathrow. The plan was recently outlined by Johnson’s advisers to Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Atlantic airline. Sources close to Johnson say the carrier expressed an interest in the project, although Virgin itself last week denied it was ready to provide financial support or move its fleet to the new hub.

The airline, which recently declared an interest in being part of a consortium to buy Gatwick airport, regards a new runway at Heathrow as a priority.

Heathrow received a further blow this weekend when Lord Smith, chairman of the Environment Agency, warned that the government failed to take the environmental impact of its planned expansion of the airport seriously enough and had taken an “illogical” approach to cutting air pollution from the proposed third runway.

Smith said he would continue to raise objections about Heathrow expansion even if the government gives approval, as expected, later this year. He said ministers would be “making the wrong decision” if they backed plans for a third runway and said the government’s assumptions about cutting pollution were flawed.

The remarks by Smith come as internal documents released under a freedom of information request to the Department for Transport show the government thought there was a “high risk” that air quality targets would not be met.

A register of risks surrounding the plans to expand Heathrow, written at the time the public consultation was approved last October, said it might prove too expensive, “impractical” or “politically unacceptable” to implement measures such as road charging to ensure that air pollution limits were met.

Justine Greening, Conservative MP for Putney, who obtained the document said: “It is clear ministers deliberately chose not to make the public aware of their own assessment of the seriousness of air and noise pollution at the time they started the consultation. When it comes to taking care of the environment and quality of life this government is now bankrupt of any integrity.”

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