Changes in technology and air transport in the UK - Executive summary

Executive Summary

Arthur D Little has conducted a study into the potential impact of changes in technology on the development of air transport in the UK on behalf of the Department for Transport (the Department).

The context for this study is twofold: the industry is facing significant technical and practical capacity constraints and due to its long-term nature has been slow to address these; and environmental issues are exerting strong pressures on the industry and its ability to grow. Against this backdrop, the UK Government will have to make sensitive decisions regarding its UK airport policy and these choices need to be based on sound judgements.

The aim of this study is to investigate how new technology can enhance airport capacity, and mitigate environmental impacts associated with the demand, development and operation of air services to, from, and within the UK. The work forms part of a programme of preparatory studies which the Department is commissioning to support development of a new airports policy statement announced in the Government's Transport White Paper "A New Deal forTransport" in July 1998.

The scope of the study is technologies predicted to enter service before 2030 with emphasis on developments in the 5 to 10 year time period and potential to substantially enhance capacity and mitigate environmental impact at UK airports. Technologies for capacity improvements at the runway, in and around the airport and in en route airspace have been addressed along with technologies for global and local environmental mitigation. Within the scope, broad commercial realities have been addressed and a greater understanding provided of the implications for prospective Government policy of future technology take-up.

Our analysis has involved a thorough desktop review, and interviews and workshop exercises with key industry stakeholders. There were a total of two workshops facilitated by Arthur D. Little during the course of this study. The first workshop addressed key technology developments until 2030 and the second addressed the key capacity and environmental issues facing the industry and the implications these have for prospective Government policy. The output from the analysis has been used to screen key future technologies for capacity enhancement and environmental mitigation, interpret their potential to address the key capacity and environmental constraints, identify barriers to take up and appropriate mechanisms to accelerate and finally an assessment of the effectiveness of these mechanisms based on our interpretation of the literature and feedback from the stakeholder consultation.

The results of this process show that in the short-term incremental improvements in capacity at UK airports are expected, with new technologies being important but not key to these improvements. In the medium- to long-term technological advances will be fundamental to introducing substantial capacity improvements, especially wake vortex technologies, sophisticated management systems and datalink technologies. The main capacity constraints are the runway and en route airspace, the rest of the ATC infrastructure is over-constrained and this leads to inefficiencies.

Technology developments until 2030 are predicted to continue to materially improve the normative (For example, CO₂ emissions per passenger kilometer is a normative measure of the global impact of aviation.) global (CO₂ and NOx emissions) and local (air quality and noise) impacts of aviation. Development of new technologies for improved aerodynamics, materials, engine efficiencies, and combustors can reduce global emissions, NOx and noise. Furthermore future development in CNS/ATM and operational procedures such as CDA additionally offer global and local mitigation. Our analysis concludes that future technologies offer fuel efficiency improvements of 2%/annum until 2030, whilst NOx reduction technology is forecast to deliver 80% reduction from todays LTO emissions by 2030. However, taken together these new technologies cannot offset the additional environmental impact associated with forecast growth in air traffic and therefore the net or overall environmental impact from aviation is predicted to increase from todays levels.

Our analysis of issues that determine technology take up concludes that the take-up of futuret echnologies to enhance capacity can be accelerated through the setting of international standards, European level agreements, and by ensuring that the positive cost benefits of efficiency projects are explicit and transparent to the key stakeholders. This is particularly important given the current emphasis by NATS on increased airport capacity as opposed to efficiency improvements, which are likely to benefit airlines much more, through reduced costs, than they will benefit NATS. The take-up of technologies that address global emissions is essentially driven by financial incentives that ensure operators aim to cut their fuel costs. Our analysis and feedback has indicated that a combined market based approach encompassing emission trading, environmental charges and voluntary agreements of incentives offers an economically and environmentally efficient way to accelerate fuel efficiency driven technologies. Take up of technologies that aim to mitigate local impacts(e.g. noise and air quality) can be driven through ambitious standards for NOx and noise, together with incentives that reward adoption of best practice. There are a number of implications for prospective Government policy if the take-up of future technologies for capacity enhancement and environmental mitigation is to be encouraged. Capacity and efficiency of airports and airspace can be improved through Government introducing mechanisms promoting benchmarking of ATC providers to raise the standard of all to that ofthe "best in class"; investment in long-term as well as short-term ATC solutions; and, the take-up of technologies with both a capacity benefit and environmental benefit.

Global and local environmental effects of the aviation industry can be mitigated through Government working with international bodies to agree medium and long-term Kyoto objectives for the sector and contributing to developing market based approaches to encourage fuel efficiency, pressing for tighter international standards on aircraft noise and engine emissions, and introducing noise and emission based charges at UK airports as appropriate. These mechanisms are largely consistent with Government's current programmes, but can be focused further to accelerate technology take-up. However, it remains for Government to consider the merits of these mechanisms within the broadercontext of Government policy.

To conclude, it must be noted that even with deployment of the most promising future technologies, if demand is unconstrained by capacity then, in absolute terms, the net effect of the aviation industry on the environment is set to increase. The implications are that one must either manage growth to what technology can deliver or accept that aviation is a high added value component of the UK's transport system.