Current Separation Minima (SM, i.e. minimum distances aircraft need to fly apart from each other at all times to ensure safety) were defined in the late 1940s for en-route and in the 1970s for airport operations, based on expert judgment and technology available at the time. Despite the subsequent gigantic leap in technology, only a few SM have been modified on the grounds of modern technological capabilities (e.g. RVSM). Conversely, the main challenge for the current ATM system is to manage the air traffic demand increase expected over the coming years. According to forecasts such as the STATFOR 2006 Long-term forecast, demand in Europe is expected to double by 2020. RESET (Reduced Separation Minima) is an European Commission co-financed project developed by a consortium formed by 14 companies led by Aena. Airports, Air Navigation Service Providers, Industry, Universities and Research Organizations are represented in the consortium. The RESET aim is to identify what reductions in SM could be achieved to meet the following challenging goal: “Where feasible, reduce SM so that they contribute towards enabling a safe factor of 2 traffic growth over Europe”. RESET is aiming to get an appropriate process on the rails which systematically works on safe reduction of separation minima where this is needed to accommodate traffic increase that is addressed by SESAR in Europe and NEXTGEN in the USA. This paper will present the approach followed by the project RESET to modify current separation minima standards maintaining or even improving safety and efficiency. The project is at its initial phase and for this reason, only few results are available at the time this paper is being written. The steps presented next should be understood just as a very high level overview of the project, which does not represent the totality of the activities considered within it. Only the first steps are addressed in more depth within this paper. 1. Identify and catalogue the current separation standards existing in the world, including ICAO and non ICAO (FAA, British, Canadian and Australian Standards). This will show what the differences are between standards, and would help to identify what areas could be potentially improved. 2. Review the foundations of the standards. The accomplishment of this work implies the revision and detailed analysis of the foundations and the work behind current separation standards. Where available any evidence, documentation, operational test, trials, safety case, simulation, study or hypothesis will be analyzed. 3. Generate a comprehensive model of the separation assurance budget identifying the various components and influencing factors that contribute to the establishment of separation minima. This representation of the separation budget will consider the influencing factors and the separation methods taken into account in the generation of current standards, and also the influencing factors derived from future technological and operational scenarios. 4. Prioritization of the most “promising” separation standards according to a list of pre-defined and agreed criteria. The categories of prioritization criteria will include both performance and sequence. Criteria such as Capacity and Efficiency will be included. The implementation time frame and sequencing of multiple “actions” will also be a criterion. The 3 most “promising” separation standards will be selected for further analysis. 5. A high-level operational concept that considers the proposed separation minima reductions will be developed through OSEDs (Operational Service and Environment Description) for en route, TMA, airport and Time-Based Spacing scenarios. The operational concepts associated to the 3 most “promising” standards will then be evaluated on safety, human factors, efficiency and economy.


    Access

    Check access

    Check availability in my library

    Order at Subito €


    Export, share and cite



    Title :

    Atm initiatives on reduced separation minima


    Contributors:


    Publication date :

    2007-10-01


    Size :

    439533 byte




    Type of media :

    Conference paper


    Type of material :

    Electronic Resource


    Language :

    English