Multicriteria-Optimized Trajectories Impacting Today’s Air Traffic Density, Efficiency, and Environmental Compatibility

摘要

Today’s air traffic system is faced with airspace capacity constraints that can cause inefficiencies in flight and inairport ground handling. Free routing performance-based navigation and harmonized airspace structures are seen asefficient mitigation measures to save distance and fuel, as far as free routes are implemented as optimized andpredictable trajectories. In this case, a monitoring of the air traffic system is expected due to an improvedpredictability of those trajectories. In this paper, a trajectory optimization model for three-dimensional free routesconsidering multiple targets is presented, including operational costs, time costs, environmental costs, and expectedexternal costs of condensation trails. The model is applied for a case study that looks at optimization of trajectories foran entire day based on the departure airport, arrival airport, and departure time in July of 2016. The resultingtrajectories are evaluated against the number of conflicts. The case study shows that today’s air traffic demandalready stresses the free route capacity when considering efficiency, ecological compatibility, and safety standards.