On Jul. 20, 2012, the State Council Information Office (SCIO) held a press conference on "Several Opinions of the State Council on Promoting the Development of the Aviation Industry" in Beijing. Huang Min, director of the Department of Basic Industries, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), commented on the construction of the new Beijing airport.

According to Huang, Beijing Capital International Airport (PEK) has already reached the saturation point. As a consequence, new takeoff and landing slots applications can hardly be granted.

Li Jiaxiang, chief of the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) revealed that, more than 400 PEK new route applications are shelved each day due to the airport congestion. Expanding the airport capacity has become the most pressing priority.

Huang pointed out that, the scale limitation restraints the expansion of the existing airport. Besides the pressure from the link-up transportation support facilities, it is rather challenging to organize the expanded airport. Moreover, the airspace/air-route management in the PEK area also bristles with difficulties. Therefore, it is inevitable to construct a new airport to boost the airport capacity in Beijing.

Huang also introduced that, the construction of the new Beijing airport has been explicitly laid out in the outline of the civil aviation "12th Five-Year Plan". Recently, certain preparations have been underway. The construction scale and standards as well as the market positioning of the new airport will be defined before the project approval. In addition, the new airport construction project cannot be set up without the final approval from the State Council. "It is still too early to talk about the scale of the new Beijing airport. The preliminary studies have yet to finish. In any case, our ultimate goal is to start the construction as soon as possible."