Airport operator BAA has released plans for a "greener and cheaper" second runway at Stansted airport in Essex.
BAA believes its new runway and other airport improvements can be completed for £2.7 billion - about £1 billion less than envisaged in the Government's aviation White Paper.
BAA's preferred option is for the runway to be shorter in length and nearer the existing runway than original Government plans.
The company, which also runs Heathrow and Gatwick airports, boasts that its new plans will involve less land and that fewer properties and listed buildings will be lost than first thought.
The new runway and other new facilities would take Stansted's annual passenger capacity to 50 million by 2013, and further work will mean the annual numbers soaring to 76 million by 2030.
BAA's preferred option, among four that the company will now consult on, would see the building of a 3,000 metre-long runway 1.4 miles east of the existing runway.
This is shorter than the 3,500 metre-long option shown in the White Paper.