An aircraft performance model implementation for the estimation of global and regional commercial aviation fuel burn and emissions

Estimates of global aviation fuel burn and emissions are currently nearly 10 years out of date. Here, the development of the Aircraft Performance Model Implementation (APMI) software which is used to update global commercial aviation fuel burn and emissions estimates is described. The results from APMI are compared with published estimates obtained using the US Federal Aviation Administration’s System for Assessing Aviation’s Global Emissions (SAGE) for the year 2006. The number of global departures modelled with the APMI software is 8% lower compared with SAGE and reflects the difference between their commercial air traffic statistics data sources. The mission fuel burn, CO₂ and H₂O estimates from APMI are approximately 20% lower than those predicted by SAGE for 2006 while the estimate for the total global aircraft SO_x emissions is approximately 40% lower. The estimates for the emissions of CO, HC and NO_x are 10%, 140% and 30% higher than those predicted by SAGE respectively. The reasons for these differences are discussed in detail.     

System for assessing Aviation’s Global Emissions (SAGE), Part 2: Uncertainty assessment

This paper focuses on assessing and applying the Federal Aviation Administration’s System for assessing Aviation’s Global Emissions (SAGE), Version 1.5, to evaluate global aircraft fuel consumption and emissions. The model is capable of computing fuel burn and emissions on a flight-by-flight, fleet and global basis. Here, a parametric study was conducted to rank-order the effects that the modeling uncertainties had on estimates of fuel burn and emissions. Statistical methods were applied to analyze both the random and systematic errors of the model. Also, applying the model to a sample policy analysis case allowed an examination of more stringent engine certification standards for mitigating aviation emissions. Uncertainties of the model were carefully accounted for in the fuel burn and emissions scenarios of the policy options. Results show that for some applications, SAGE may be used to resolve small differences in fleet emissions performance. Although the absolute uncertainty in flight-by-flight NO_x predictions from the model are of the order of 40%, results show that it is well within the current capabilities of the model to distinguish between the fleet average NO_x emissions associated with the typical NO_x stringency options considered in policy analyses.     

Economic and emissions impacts of renewable fuel goals for aviation in the US

The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has a goal that one billion gallons of renewable jet fuel is consumed by the US aviation industry each year from 2018. We examine the economic and emissions impacts of this goal using renewable fuel produced from a Hydroprocessed Esters and Fatty Acids (HEFA) process from renewable oils. Our approach employs an economy-wide model of economic activity and energy systems and a detailed partial equilibrium model of the aviation industry. If soybean oil is used as a feedstock, we find that meeting the aviation biofuel goal in 2020 will require an implicit subsidy from airlines to biofuel producers of $2.69 per gallon of renewable jet fuel. If the aviation goal can be met by fuel from oilseed rotation crops grown on otherwise fallow land, the implicit subsidy is $0.35 per gallon of renewable jet fuel. As commercial aviation biofuel consumption represents less than 2% of total fuel used by this industry, the goal has a small impact on the average price of jet fuel and carbon dioxide emissions. We also find that, under the pathways we examine, the cost per tonne of CO₂ abated due to aviation biofuels is between $50 and $400.     

System for assessing Aviation’s Global Emissions (SAGE), Part 1: Model description and inventory results

In early 2001, the US Federal Aviation Administration embarked on a multi-year effort to develop a new computer model, the System for assessing Aviation’s Global Emissions (SAGE). Currently at Version 1.5, the basic use of the model has centered on the development of yearly global inventories of commercial aircraft fuel burn and emissions of various pollutants to serve as the basis for scenario modeling. This paper describes the algorithms and data used in the model as well as the results from initial validation assessments. SAGE results indicate that global fuel burn and nitrogen oxide (NO_x) emissions decreased by over 6% from 2000 to 2001 (fuel burn and NO_x), and then steadily increased to over 12% (fuel burn) and 15.5% (NO_x) above 2000 levels in 2005. Comparisons to the results from previous studies have shown that SAGE tends to agree more closely with fuel burn and NO_x than with CO and HC. Validation assessments have shown that SAGE can predict per flight fuel burn to within 3% on an average basis with no apparent bias, when compared to about 60,000 flight’s worth of data from a major US airline and about 20,000 flight’s worth of data from two major Japanese airlines.     

Global carbon dioxide emissions scenarios for aviation derived from IPCC storylines: A meta-analysis

This research summarises the aviation CO₂ emissions studies that use the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change IS92 and Special Report on Emissions Scenarios storylines as GDP growth assumptions to estimate future global carbon dioxide emissions from the aviation sector. The inter-quartile mean and the first and third quartiles are calculated to enable researches studying climate change policies for aviation to use an average global baseline scenario with lower and upper boundaries. We also perform a simple meta-analysis to analyse the assumptions used to derive the baseline scenario and conclude, as expected, that change in revenue-tonne-kilometres and fuel-efficiency are the main drivers behind the baseline scenarios.     

Analysis of a proposed mechanism for carbon-neutral growth in international aviation

In October 2013, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) announced that it would put in place a market-based mechanism to cap net greenhouse gas emissions from international civil aviation at 2020 levels. This paper analyses the obligations that would be placed on real airlines under an initial draft “Strawman” proposal that was originally formulated as a starting point for discussions within ICAO, and the extent to which such a proposal would succeed in keeping emissions at or below the desired level. The provisions of the ICAO proposal were then applied to more than 100 existing airlines. In order to protect commercial sensitivities, we used hierarchical cluster analysis to identify groups of different types of airlines. We report the results for these groups rather than for individual airlines. While ambiguities in the Strawman proposal complicated the analysis, we found that, depending on their size and rate of growth, airlines will be required to offset very different proportions of their emissions from international flights. A system of de minimis exemptions, as currently proposed, would benefit some rich countries as well as poor ones. Targeting such exemptions more narrowly would raise practical difficulties, which we describe. We conclude by recommending that ICAO design and implement a much simpler system; and propose one alternative.     

Air transportation in a carbon constrained world: Long-term dynamics of policies and strategies for mitigating the carbon footprint of commercial aviation

With increasing demand for air transportation worldwide and decreasing marginal fuel efficiency improvements, the contribution of aviation to climate change relative to other sectors is projected to increase in the future. As a result, growing public and political pressures are likely to further target air transportation to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions. The key challenges faced by policy makers and air transportation industry stakeholders is to reduce aviation greenhouse gas emissions while sustaining mobility for passengers and time-sensitive cargo as well as meeting future demand for air transportation in developing and emerging countries. This paper examines five generic policies for reducing the emissions of commercial aviation; (1) technological efficiency improvements, (2) operational efficiency improvements, (3) use of alternative fuels, (4) demand shift and (5) carbon pricing (i.e. market-based incentives). In order to evaluate the impacts of these policies on total emissions, air transport mobility, airfares and airline profitability, a system dynamics modeling approach was used. The Global Aviation Industry Dynamics (GAID) model captures the systemic interactions and the delayed feedbacks in the air transportation system and allows scenarios testing through simulations. For this analysis, a set of 34 scenarios with various levels of aggressiveness along the five generic policies were simulated and tested. It was found that no single policy can maintain emissions levels steady while increasing projected demand for air transportation. Simulation results suggest that a combination of the proposed policies does produce results that are close to a “weak” sustainability definition of increasing supply to meet new demand needs while maintaining constant or increasing slightly emissions levels. A combination of policies that includes aggressive levels of technological and operations efficiency improvements, use of biofuels along with moderate levels of carbon pricing and short-haul demand shifts efforts achieves a 140% increase in capacity in 2024 over 2004 while only increasing emissions by 20% over 2004. In addition, airline profitability is moderately impacted (10% reduction) compared to other scenarios where profitability is reduced by over 50% which pose a threat to necessary investments and the implementation of mitigating measures to reduce CO2 emissions. This study has shown that an approach based on a portfolio of mitigating measures and policies spanning across technology and operational improvements, use of biofuels, demand shift and carbon pricing is required to transition the air transportation industry close to an operating point of environmental and mobility sustainability.     

Can we reliably assess climate mitigation options for air traffic scenarios despite large uncertainties in atmospheric processes?

Air traffic has an increasing influence on climate; therefore identifying mitigation options to reduce the climate impact of aviation becomes more and more important. Aviation influences climate through several climate agents, which show different dependencies on the magnitude and location of emission and the spatial and temporal impacts. Even counteracting effects can occur. Therefore, it is important to analyse all effects with high accuracy to identify mitigation potentials. However, the uncertainties in calculating the climate impact of aviation are partly large (up to a factor of about 2). In this study, we present a methodology, based on a Monte Carlo simulation of an updated non-linear climate-chemistry response model AirClim, to integrate above mentioned uncertainties in the climate assessment of mitigation options. Since mitigation options often represent small changes in emissions, we concentrate on a more generalised approach and use exemplarily different normalised global air traffic inventories to test the methodology. These inventories are identical in total emissions but differ in the spatial emission distribution. We show that using the Monte Carlo simulation and analysing relative differences between scenarios lead to a reliable assessment of mitigation potentials. In a use case we show that the presented methodology can be used to analyse even small differences between scenarios with mean flight altitude variations.     

Comparison of emerging ground propulsion systems for electrified aircraft taxi operations

Aviation is a mode with high fuel consumption per passenger mile and has significant environmental impacts. It is important to seek ways to reduce fuel consumption by the aviation sector, but it is difficult to improve fuel efficiency during the en-route cruise phase of flight because of technology barriers, safety requirements, and the mode of operations of air transportation. Recent efforts have emphasized the development of innovative Aircraft Ground Propulsion Systems (AGPS) for electrified aircraft taxi operations. These new technologies are expected to significantly reduce aircraft ground-movement-related fuel burn and emissions. This study compares various emerging AGPS systems and presents a comprehensive review on the merits and demerits of each system, followed with the local environmental impacts assessment of these systems. Using operational data for the 10 busiest U.S. airports, a comparison of environmental impacts is performed for four kinds of AGPS: conventional, single engine-on, external, and on-board systems. The results show that there are tradeoffs in fuel and emissions among these emerging technologies. On-board system shows the best performance in the emission reduction, while external system shows the least fuel burn. Compared to single-engine scenario, external AGPS shows the reduction of HC and CO emissions but the increase of NO_x emission. When a general indicator is considered, on-board AGPS shows the best potential of reducing local environmental impacts. The benefit-cost analysis shows that both external and on-board systems are worth being implemented and the on-board system appeals to be more beneficial.     

Are technology myths stalling aviation climate policy?

Emissions from aviation will continue to increase in the future, in contradiction of global climate policy objectives. Yet, airlines and airline organisations suggest that aviation will become climatically sustainable. This paper investigates this paradox by reviewing fuel-efficiency gains since the 1960s in comparison to aviation growth, and by linking these results to technology discourses, based on a two-tiered approach tracing technology-focused discourses over 20 years (1994–2013). Findings indicate that a wide range of solutions to growing emissions from aviation have been presented by industry, hyped in global media, and subsequently vanished to be replaced by new technology discourses. Redundant discourses often linger in the public domain, where they continue to be associated with industry aspirations of ‘sustainable aviation’ and ‘zero-emission flight’. The paper highlights and discusses a number of technology discourses that constitute ‘technology myths’, and the role these ‘myths’ may be playing in the enduring but flawed promise of sustainable aviation. We conclude that technology myths require policy-makers to interpret and take into account technical uncertainty, which may result in inaction that continues to delay much needed progress in climate policy for aviation.     

Estimating fuel burn impacts of taxi-out delay with implications for gate-hold benefits

The aviation community is actively investigating initiatives to reduce aircraft fuel consumption from surface operations, as surface management strategies may face fewer implementation barriers compared with en route strategies. One fuel-saving initiative for the air transportation system is the possibility of holding aircraft at the gate, or the spot, until the point at which they can taxi unimpeded to the departure runway. The extent to which gate holding strategies have financial and environmental benefits hinges on the quantity of fuel that is consumed during surface operations. A pilot of an aircraft may execute the taxi procedure on a single engine or utilize different engine thrust rates during taxi because of a delay. In the following study, we use airline fuel consumption data to estimate aircraft taxi fuel consumption rates during the “unimpeded” and “delayed” portions of taxi time. We find that the fuel consumption attributed to a minute of taxi-out delay is less than that attributed to minute of unimpeded taxi time; for some aircraft types, the fuel consumption rate for a minute of taxi delay is half of that for unimpeded taxi. It is therefore not appropriate, even for rough calculations, to apply nominal taxi fuel consumption rates to convert delayed taxi-out time into fuel burn. On average we find that eliminating taxi delay would reduce overall flight fuel consumption by about 1%. When we consider the savings on an airport-by-airport basis, we find that for some airports the potential reduction from reducing taxi delay is as much as 2%.     

Short/medium-term prediction for the aviation emissions in the en route airspace considering the fluctuation in air traffic demand

This paper proposes a novel short/medium-term prediction method for aviation emissions distribution in en route airspace. An en route traffic demand model characterizing both the dynamics and the fluctuation of the actual traffic demand is developed, based on which the variation and the uncertainty of the short/medium-term traffic growth are predicted. Building on the demand forecast the Boeing Fuel Flow Method 2 is applied to estimate the fuel consumption and the resulting aviation emissions in the en route airspace. Based on the traffic demand prediction and the en route emissions estimation, an aviation emissions prediction model is built, which can be used to forecast the generation of en route emissions with uncertainty limits. The developed method is applied to a real data set from Hefei Area Control Center for the en route emission prediction in the next 5 years, with time granularities of both months and years. To validate the uncertainty limits associated with the emission prediction, this paper also presents the prediction results based on future traffic demand derived from the regression model widely adopted by FAA and Eurocontrol. The analysis of the case study shows that the proposed method can characterize well the dynamics and the fluctuation of the en route emissions, thereby providing satisfactory prediction results with appropriate uncertainty limits. The prediction results show a gradual growth at an average annual rate of 7.74%, and the monthly prediction results reveal distinct fluctuation patterns in the growth.     

A comparative study of aviation safety briefing media: card,video, and video with interactive controls

Passengers’ safety knowledge is a key factor in determining the chance of surviving any life- or injury-threatening situation that could occur in civil aviation. Aviation regulations require airlines to provide safety briefings to inform passengers of safety procedures on board. The safety briefing card and the safety briefing video are the two media that airlines routinely employ on board to this purpose. Unfortunately, research on aviation safety briefing media has cast serious doubts about their efficacy, urging researchers to better understand what makes safety briefing media effective as well as improving their effectiveness. This paper contributes to such goals in two different ways. First, it proposes the introduction of interactive technology into aviation safety briefings for improving their effectiveness. Second, it illustrates a controlled study that compares the effectiveness of three safety briefing media: the two briefing media that airlines currently employ on-board (safety briefing card and safety briefing video) and a safety briefing video extended with basic interactive controls. The results obtained by the study highlight a superior effectiveness of the two video media over the card media for aviation safety briefings. Moreover, the video with interactive controls produced improvements over the card in a larger number of effectiveness measures than the traditional video. The paper includes a discussion of factors that can explain the better results obtained with the video conditions, and in particular the video with interactive controls, and of possible additional extensions to increase the interactivity of aviation safety briefings.     

Probabilistic assessment of aviation CO2 emission targets

Passenger demand for air transportation is expected to continue growing into the future. The increase in operations will undoubtedly lead to an escalation in harmful carbon dioxide emissions, an adverse effect that governing bodies have been striving to mitigate. The International Air Transport Association has set aggressive environmental targets for the global aviation industry. This paper investigates the achievability of those targets in the US using a top-down partial equilibrium model of the aviation system complemented with a previously developed fleet turnover procedure. Three ‘enablers’ are considered: aircraft technologies, operational improvements and sustainable biofuels. To account for sources of uncertainty, Monte Carlo simulations are conducted to run a multitude of scenarios. It was found that the likelihood of meeting all targets is extremely low (0.3%) for the expected demand growth rates in the US. Results show that biofuels have the most impact on system CO₂ emissions, responsible for an average 64% of the total savings by 2050 (with aircraft technologies and operational improvements responsible for 31% and 5%, respectively). However, this impact is associated with high uncertainty and very dependent on both biofuel type and availability.     

Assessment of stratospheric fuel burn by civil commercial aviation

When jetliners fly in the stratosphere, their emissions tend to be longer-lived and therefore have greater environmental impact. Since the altitude of the tropopause is not consistent and can be as low as 23,000 ft., cruising flights may have a great chance to fly into the stratosphere. In this paper, we present a simple and rapid method to estimate the extent of US commercial passenger and cargo flight that currently occurs in the stratosphere, based on publicly available historical data from 2008 to 2012. We model the vertical profile of a flight and compare it with the height of the tropopause along its route. Our analysis covers 78% of the total travelled distance reported by the United States Bureau of Transportation Statistics, and shows that these flights burnt ∼11 million tons of fuel annually, or ∼31% of cruise fuel, in the stratosphere between 2008 and 2012. Our results also show that the chance of flying into stratosphere varies by area, but flights within the contiguous United States tend to stay below the stratosphere. Moreover, the stratosphere fuel burn of Asia-US flights may be significantly reduced by taking jet stream routes.     

A comparative life-cycle energy and emissions analysis for intercity passenger transportation in the U.S. by aviation,intercity bus,and automobile

Intercity passenger trips constitute a significant source of energy consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, and criteria pollutant emissions. The most commonly used city-to-city modes in the United States include aircraft, intercity bus, and automobile. This study applies state-of-the-practice models to assess life-cycle fuel consumption and pollutant emissions for intercity trips via aircraft, intercity bus, and automobile. The analyses compare the fuel and emissions impacts of different travel mode scenarios for intercity trips ranging from 200 to 1600 km. Because these modes operate differently with respect to engine technology, fuel type, and vehicle capacity, the modeling techniques and modeling boundaries vary significantly across modes. For aviation systems, much of the energy and emissions are associated with auxiliary equipment activities, infrastructure power supply, and terminal activities, in addition to the vehicle operations between origin/destination. Furthermore, one should not ignore the embodied energy and initial emissions from the manufacturing of the vehicles, and the construction of airports, bus stations, highways and parking lots. Passenger loading factors and travel distances also significantly influence fuel and emissions results on a per-traveler basis. The results show intercity bus is generally the most fuel-efficient mode and produced the lowest per-passenger-trip emissions for the entire range of trip distances examined. Aviation is not a fuel-efficient mode for short trips (<500 km), primarily due to the large energy impacts associated with takeoff and landing, and to some extent from the emissions of ground support equipment associated with any trip distance. However, aviation is more energy efficient and produces less emissions per-passenger-trip than low-occupancy automobiles for trip distances longer than 700–800 km. This study will help inform policy makers and transportation system operators about how differently each intercity system perform across all activities, and provides a basis for future policies designed to encourage mode shifts by range of service. The estimation procedures used in this study can serve as a reference for future analyses of transportation scenarios.     

Fueling for contingencies: The hidden cost of unpredictability in the air transportation system

The aviation community is increasing its attention on the concept of predictability when conducting aviation service quality assessments. Reduced fuel consumption and the related cost is one of the various benefits that could be achieved through improved flight predictability. A lack of predictability may cause airline dispatchers to load more fuel onto aircraft before they depart; the flights would then in turn consume extra fuel just to carry excess fuel loaded. In this study, we employ a large dataset with flight-level fuel loading and consumption information from a major US airline. With these data, we estimate the relationship between the amount of loaded fuel and flight predictability performance using a statistical model. The impact of loaded fuel is translated into fuel consumption and, ultimately, fuel cost and environmental impact for US domestic operations. We find that a one-minute increase in the standard deviation of airborne time leads to a 0.88 min increase in loaded contingency fuel and 1.66 min in loaded contingency and alternate fuel. If there were no unpredictability in the aviation system, captured in our model by eliminating standard deviation in flight time, the reduction in the loaded fuel would between 6.12 and 11.28 min per flight. Given a range of fuel prices, this ultimately would translate into cost savings for US domestic airlines on the order of $120–$452 million per year.     

Time to burn: Flight delay,terminal efficiency,and fuel consumption in the National Airspace System

Improved Air Traffic Management (ATM) leading to reduced en route and gate delay, greater predictability in flight planning, and reduced terminal inefficiencies has a role to play in reducing aviation fuel consumption. Air navigation service providers are working to quantify this role to help prioritize and justify ATM modernization efforts. In the following study we analyze actual flight-level fuel consumption data reported by a major U.S. based airline to study the possible fuel savings from ATM improvements that allow flights to better adhere to their planned trajectories both en route and in the terminal area. To do so we isolate the contribution of airborne delay, departure delay, excess planned flight time, and terminal area inefficiencies on fuel consumption using econometric techniques. The model results indicate that, for two commonly operated aircraft types, the system-wide averages of flight fuel consumption attributed to ATM delay and terminal inefficiencies are 1.0–1.5% and 1.5–4.5%, respectively. We quantify the fuel impact of predicted delay to be 10–20% that of unanticipated delay, reinforcing the role of flight plan predictability in reducing fuel consumption. We rank terminal areas by quantifying a Terminal Inefficiency metric based on the variation in terminal area fuel consumed across flights. Our results help prioritize ATM modernization investments by quantifying the trade-offs in planned and unplanned delays and identifying terminal areas with high potential for improvement.     

Improving airline fuel efficiency via fuel burn prediction and uncertainty estimation

Reducing fuel consumption is a unifying goal across the aviation industry. One fuel-saving opportunity for airlines is the possibility of reducing discretionary fuel loading by dispatchers. In this study, we propose a novel discretionary fuel estimation approach that can assist dispatchers with better discretionary fuel loading decisions. Based on the analysis on our study airline, our approach is found to substantially reduce unnecessary discretionary fuel loading while maintaining the same safety level compared to the current fuel loading practice. The idea is that by providing dispatchers with more accurate information and better recommendations derived from flight records, unnecessary fuel loading and corresponding cost-to-carry could both be reduced. We apply ensemble learning techniques to improve fuel burn prediction and construct prediction intervals (PIs) to capture the uncertainty of model predictions. The upper bound of a PI can then be used for discretionary fuel loading. The potential benefit of this approach is estimated to be $61.5 million in fuel savings and 428 million kg of CO₂ reduction per year for our study airline. This study also builds a link between discretionary fuel estimation and aviation system predictability in which the proposed models can also be used to predict benefits from reduced fuel loading enabled by improved Air Traffic Management (ATM) targeting on improved system predictability.     

全球民航事故调查数据统计与分析

为探索全球民航事故的发生及调查规律,从航空安全网(ASN)采集626起事故调查数据,对事故发生季度、类型、机型等特征进行统计分析,同时对事故调查的实施机构、调查时长、各类事故调查时长等特征展开分析。结果发现:全球民航事故随运行时间的增加呈现波浪形缓慢下降;事故数量最多的前两位为冲偏出跑道和飞机失去控制,并多集中在第三季度(7-9月);波音公司各机型事故曲线整体类似,同时与空客公司各机型飞机事故曲线存在差异。民航事故调查从开始到发布报告的平均周期为26.1个月;各调查机构针对冲偏出跑道、失去控制、可控飞行撞地事故的平均调查周期分别为22.2、40.4、12.4个月。研究结果为民航事故预防政策制定及事故调查提供参考依据。