Eco-flying gains altitude, thanks to smarter air traffic tools
“Our approach could help reduce CO2 equivalent emissions in EU airspace by millions of tonnes.”
CONCERTO’s digital solution piggybacks on current air traffic management infrastructure, using decision-making algorithms and cutting-edge climate science, to optimise both traffic capacity and environmental performance, aided by new climate monitoring and mitigation measures. “Our approach could help reduce CO2 equivalent emissions in EU airspace by hundreds of thousands of tonnes short term, then by millions longer term if the system is widely deployed,” says David Antonello, green operations project leader at Thales, and coordinator of the CONCERTO project. Supported by the SESAR JU, the CONCERTO project will develop two complementary tools. The ‘Orchestrator for Eco-friendly Operations’ focuses on reducing CO2 emissions, automatically suggesting eco-friendly time slots to air navigation service providers (ANSPs) during route planning. This allows airspace users, such as airline operations control centres and flight planning providers, to schedule emission-reducing flight paths. Secondly, the ‘Traffic Flow Optimiser’ will address a long-standing issue for greener aviation: that alongside CO2 reductions, non-CO2 pollutants – such as engine particles (nitrogen oxides) and persistent contrails – need to be minimised. The tool will help operators monitor and make decisions about air traffic flow balancing likely environmental benefits against operational costs and capacity concerns.
A greener flight path
“The challenge will be forecasting, finding and then managing the highest contributors to climate impacts across multi-ANSPs,” adds Antonello. This involves estimating the climate impact of aircraft in a given area, as well as identifying climate-sensitive areas and the most polluting aircraft, and proposing mitigation plans. “It won’t be necessary to modify all trajectories. We know that 80 % of contrails-related climate impacts from transatlantic flights could be avoided by acting on 12 % of flights,” Antonello explains. The system’s success will rely on data supplied by project partners, who represent a range of industry stakeholders and climate scientists. Tests will simulate the relaxation of air traffic constraints during eco-friendly time slots over large areas of European airspace, to assess the environmental benefits, as well as investigating the degree to which modified flight paths could reduce contrails. “We will deploy our solutions in tandem with current systems. Longer term we will need strong support from aviation industry regulations to accelerate deployment at scale,” concludes Antonello.
Keywords
aviation, SESAR JU, sustainability, carbon neutrality, air traffic management, ATM, Green Deal, environmental impact, Horizon Europe, Digital European Sky, emissions, reduction