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Projecte llegit

Títol: Assessing the airport facilities in the context of UAM operations

Estudiants que han llegit aquest projecte:

Director/a: KULJANIN, JOVANA

Departament: FIS

Títol: Assessing the airport facilities in the context of UAM operations

Data inici oferta: 14-03-2022     Data finalització oferta: 14-11-2022


Estudis d'assignació del projecte:
    GR ENG SIST AEROESP
Tipus: Individual
 
Lloc de realització: EETAC
 
Paraules clau:
UAM, VTOLs, Airport facilities, Airport integration, Safety
 
Descripció del contingut i pla d'activitats:
Urban air mobility (UAM) is deemed as a paradigm shift in passenger transport mode for intra and inter-urban transport. The concept is underpinned by novel aircraft types with the capability for vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) and using electrical propulsion and energy storage. The current VTOL aircraft prototypes substantially vary in configuration and design, enabling different UAM missions and concepts of operations. Although still in the innovation trigger phase, some of these VTOL aircraft is expected to be autonomous and pilotless designed for one to five passengers onboard.
While most of the UAM passenger-related service will require a dedicated VTOL ground infrastructure for take-off and landing (often referred as vertiports), some of the operational concepts envisions the integration of these vehicles into existing airports. This particularly refers to the UAM mission which aims to connect the city center (or suburb) with airport. However, this process is not straightforward, as it requires a thorough assessment of different operational and safety aspects in order to allow the seamless operation of these new vehicles given their distinctive characteristics. In addition, it order to accommodate these types of vehicles and provide satisfactory level of service to all stakeholders (i.e., airlines), the airports will need to redesign some of the existing procedures and acquire adequate facilities.
The project aims at investigating the need for new airport facilities in the light of potential integration of VTOL vehicles. With its new characteristics to be autonomous, some of the airside facilities and procedures needs to be radically upgraded in order to enable the safe integration into the current airport system.

1. Identify different configurations and designs of VTOL in order to understand their specific characteristics;
2. Identify the requirements for the new facilities to support VTOL vehicle integration into airport environment;
3. Analyze how the current facilities can be adjusted to accommodate VTOL vehicles;
4. Analyze the new facilities with respect to different airside processes (turn around process, boarding, de-icing, taxi, etc.,);
5. Understand the safety threats of the potential integration of VTOL vehicles


 
Overview (resum en anglès):
UAM mobility is deemed as a paradigm shift in passenger transport mode for intra- and inter-urban transport. This concept is supported by the appearance of new types of aircraft with the capability of vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) and the use of electric propulsion and energy storage. Current VTOL vehicle prototypes vary substantially in configuration and design, resulting in different UAM missions and concepts of operations. Although still in the so-called innovation trigger phase, growing interest from large investors and existing (NASA) and emerging (Lilium) companies implies the expectation of some of these VTOL aircraft to end up being pilotless, autonomous aircraft designed for between one and five passengers on board.

While most of the UAM passenger-related service will require dedicated VTOL ground infrastructure for takeoff and landing (often referred as vertiports), some of the operational concepts contemplate integrating these vehicles into existing airports. This refers particularly to the UAM mission which aims to connect the city center (or suburb) with the airport. However, this process is not straightforward, as it requires a thorough evaluation of different operational and safety aspects to allow the smooth operation of these new vehicles given their distinctive characteristics. Furthermore, to accommodate these types of vehicles and provide a satisfactory level of service to all stakeholders (i.e., airlines), airports will need to acquire adequate facilities and learn to manage these new operations alongside conventional aviation.

This project aims to investigate the need for new airport facilities in the light of potential integration of VTOL vehicles. With their new autonomy features, some of the airside facilities need to be radically upgraded to allow safe integration into the current airport system. To do this, this analysis is divided into two parts. The first part is oriented to the description and analysis of the different models and configurations of VTOL aircraft that can be found nowadays together with the nature of the missions that can be carried out. The second part of the study introduces a background and an initial approach to the integration of UAM services in the airport environment to finish by analysing two hypothetical application scenarios to reality with their corresponding identification of the new and existing facilities necessary to accommodate these new operations concepts.

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