空中交通管制计划路线，以节省燃料的航班

本文首次发表于企业绿色。

Aviation emissions are a problem. Currently, they equate to about 2 percent of total global温室气体排放, but they are expected to make up a much larger share in the coming years as global trade increases and other sectors start to decarbonize. EU aviation emissions, which represent a third of total global emissions from aviation, have doubled since 1990 and are predicted to triple by 2050 if unchecked.

2.2万架次通过英国领空每年通过负责每年投入约23亿吨二氧化碳在大气中的 - 大约相当于6个燃煤电厂的年排放量。

Reducing U.K. aviation emissions is win-win for the environment and the airlines — if less fuel is burnt, carriers are lowering their costs and pumping fewer emissions into the atmosphere. But how to address the problem? International talks at the U.N. have yielded only a set of voluntary pledges, and while the industry is investing in alternative greener fuels and更高效的飞机由波音公司研究,last year predicted在役飞机的数量将在2011年和2031之间翻番, most likely pushing up emissions regardless of any fuel efficiency improvements.

一个组织试图拖延的航空业排放的这种增长是NATS，空中交通服务公司控制英国领空。自2008年以来，NATS一直致力于向使用更少的燃料更流畅，更直接的路线，而且每年节约是围绕万吨航空相关的二氧化碳。

这些改进等同于在节省燃油174亿$航空公司，平均4.3％切在每个航班的二氧化碳排放量针对2006年的基准，击败NATS”目标在2014年年底提高4％，这是伊恩·乔普森，在NATS环境和社区事务的负责人，好消息，因为这意味着该公司已获得来自航空公司奖金。NATS是世界上唯一的空中交通服务提供者在财政诱因，以改善环境性能和可能面临的727万$的罚款，如果它未能命中4％的目标。

Now, Jopson is tasked with helping NATS hit a 10 percent reduction by 2020 with the stakes raised even higher. "We could potentially win or lose 1 percent of our turnover," he admitted, rather more cheerfully than you might expect. "[But] it's good news for me, because when you have bonus and penalties on delivery of a plan, then it gets on to the managing director and chief executive's scorecards pretty quickly, which raises the profile through the organization."

在过去的六年中，NATS 300多个空域和程序上的变化带来了改善飞行剖面，并减少燃油消耗，从消除壁垒空域的某些部门，这使得更多的直航航线航班，鼓励飞行员向更高效飞行，比如下坡滑行降落到。与军方谈判在某些时候使用它以前限制空域节省3万吨的二氧化碳排放。

NATS的下一个目标是到2020年，达到每飞行的二氧化碳排放量降低10％。

技术也发挥了作用 - 被带到上个月称为GAATS +新的软件工具，以帮助控制器得到跨越北大西洋更有效的配置文件，节省了进一步的11万吨该技术甚至考虑到飞机失去质量，因为他们燃烧燃料，使他们能够爬升到更高的高度更接近最佳的轨道，可以采取高风的优势。

Collaboration with counterparts in other jurisdictions also has helped bring down burn rates. The winningly named X-Man project — more prosaically, the Cross Border Arrival Management Initiative — involves asking other air traffic organizations to slow aircraft down so they spend more time cruising, which is far more efficient than circling holding patterns over airports. Just slowing down aircraft has taken more than a minute off holding time for every aircraft that holds around Heathrow.

Working out the savings takes a hefty dose of computing power. "Every aircraft that goes through our airspace has an environmental efficiency score — to compute those scores we have to analyze over a billion radar points," Jopson said. "No one else does it to that level of granularity."

不过，虽然NATS无疑取得了优异的成绩，在未来推动实现节省10％的可能获得射击更加疯狂的电路。

乔普森正在监督一个$ 909万美元的“全面彻底”在英格兰东南部及以上曼彻斯特的领空，他说，将提高安全性，容量和环保性能，通过“可实现连续攀升，更多的点对点航线，[和]战略性德的重新设计通过该空域-conflicting业务流“。

上述伦敦和东南部的天空是一些最繁忙的世界和乔普森是肯定的伦敦空域管理计划“可能我们会永远承担的最大空域的改变。”新的，高度精确的卫星导航技术将使飞机来接近对方，更贴近他们更优化，而不影响安全性。

控制器也将给予帮助的计划更有效的路线更好的信息。目前，当他们结束自己的转变NATS可以给控制器关于他们的环境性能数据，但乔普森想获得到的情况“，其中的信息是他们的控制屏幕上，使他们能够做出的最好的数据决定如何在环境方面有效的途径选择是“。

However, a 10 percent saving remains a testing target. Jopson freely admitted when it was set he did not know if it would be achievable and that reaching it will require him and his team to come up with more ideas.

“我们的预测表明，即使我们提供所有这些事情，仍然会有到10％的目标差距2020年，”乔普森说。“我们正在努力思考，其中额外的1％或2％是从哪儿来。”

Teams of controllers and pilots are convened regularly to discuss how to tackle remaining inefficiencies, while Jopson also holds out hope further savings could come from working closer with other national operators.

它有望成为一个巨大的挑战 - 但你会希望如果有人能降落的东西这么大，这将是空中交通管制。