TY - JOUR

T1 - A Fuel-Payload Ratio Based Flight-Segmentation Benchmark

AU - Kaivanto, Kim Kaleva

AU - Zhang, Peng

N1 - This is the author’s version of a work that was accepted for publication in Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version was subsequently published in Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment, 63, 2018 DOI: 10.1016/j.trd.2018.06.014

PY - 2018/8

Y1 - 2018/8

N2 - Airlines and their customers have an interest in determining fuel- and emissions-minimizing flight segmentation. Starting from Kuchemann's Weight Model and the Breguet Range Equation for cruise-fuel consumption, we build an idealized model of optimal flight segmentation for maximizing fuel efficiency and minimizing emissions under the assumption that each leg is operated with an aircraft of segment-length-matching design range. When a multi-leg (>=2) itinerary is most efficient, legs are ideally of equal length. Instrumental to the parsimony of this flight-segmentation benchmark is a new efficiency metric: Fuel-Payload Ratio (FPR). The FPR approach has a one-to-one correspondence with the standard microeconomic cost-curves framework, which avails the standard tools of microeconomic analysis for cost-efficient design-range determination and optimal flight segmentation. This makes it possible to make direct comparisons between (i) technically efficient design-range and flight-segmentation solutions and (ii) their economically efficient counterparts. Even modest fixed-cost components cause the latter to diverge non-trivially from the former.

AB - Airlines and their customers have an interest in determining fuel- and emissions-minimizing flight segmentation. Starting from Kuchemann's Weight Model and the Breguet Range Equation for cruise-fuel consumption, we build an idealized model of optimal flight segmentation for maximizing fuel efficiency and minimizing emissions under the assumption that each leg is operated with an aircraft of segment-length-matching design range. When a multi-leg (>=2) itinerary is most efficient, legs are ideally of equal length. Instrumental to the parsimony of this flight-segmentation benchmark is a new efficiency metric: Fuel-Payload Ratio (FPR). The FPR approach has a one-to-one correspondence with the standard microeconomic cost-curves framework, which avails the standard tools of microeconomic analysis for cost-efficient design-range determination and optimal flight segmentation. This makes it possible to make direct comparisons between (i) technically efficient design-range and flight-segmentation solutions and (ii) their economically efficient counterparts. Even modest fixed-cost components cause the latter to diverge non-trivially from the former.

KW - Scheduled passenger air transport

KW - flight segmentation

KW - fuel efficiency

KW - greenhouse gas emissions

KW - microeconomics

U2 - 10.1016/j.trd.2018.06.014

DO - 10.1016/j.trd.2018.06.014

M3 - Journal article

VL - 63

SP - 548

EP - 559

JO - Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment

JF - Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment

SN - 1361-9209

ER -