Department Flight Operations Concepts
Gabriele Maltinti – stock.adobe.com
Air Transport – A Complex System
Air transport is shaped by a variety of stakeholders, including airlines, air traffic service providers and airports. These stakeholders face the challenge of ensuring the safe and efficient transportation of passengers and cargo while also meeting increasing societal demands.
Our Work in Flight Operations Concepts
In our department for Flight Operations Concepts, we focus on the development and modelling of innovative procedures and technologies aimed at making air transport more climate-compatible and efficient. In doing so, our department contributes to one of the institute’s core competencies by developing and applying operational and technological assessment capabilities. A particular focus of our work lies in the thorough evaluation of technological innovations in air transport with regard to their environmental and operational impacts. Through our work, we help to reduce the environmental footprint of air transport and support its continued development towards greater operational efficiency.
Our Research Focus Areas
Specifically, we address the following topics:
- Flight Planning Optimisation: We examine how flight planning processes for aircraft operations can be optimised, including the planning of flight trajectories while taking aircraft performance limitations into account.
- Network Optimisation: We model and optimise air transport networks for the efficient management of air traffic flows.
- Operational Infrastructures: We develop new flight operation concepts within the context of realistic infrastructure scenarios.
- Emissions Levels: We quantify emission levels at the level of individual flights and fleets, and create emission inventories for air transport.
- Impact Assessment: We investigate new aircraft and propulsion technologies to assess their contribution to reducing the environmental and climate impact of air transport.
- Regulatory Concepts: We develop concepts that serve as a basis for environmental policy instruments in air transport, including concepts for the European Emissions Trading System and its implications for flight operations.
- Modelling Methods: We develop and utilise advanced methods in mathematical optimisation, artificial intelligence, and efficient data management and visualisation.
Realistic Assessment of Innovative Concepts
The concepts and technologies we develop are evaluated under realistic operational conditions. Through close cooperation with the relevant stakeholders, we ensure that the influencing factors and conditions critical to the success of new flight operation concepts are identified at an early stage. These insights feed directly into the development of the concepts. From an operator’s perspective, we also consider the “net benefit” – such as gains in efficiency or environmental advantages – which contributes to the overall evaluation.