Analyzing the Departure Runway Capacity Effects of Integrating Optimized Continuous Climb Operations

Abstract

Performing Continuous Climb Operation (CCO) procedures enable the reduction of the environmental footprint and the improvement of the trajectory efficiency when individually operated. However, its operation may affect negatively the overall operational efficiency at Terminal Manoeuvring Areas (TMAs). The estimation of capacity is a matter of paramount importance to all airport planning and analyzing the capacity effects of this particular operational technique on a certain scenario will definitely help on evaluating its potential applicability. In this paper, departure runway capacity at the Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas airport was operationally evaluated when introducing CCOs. The considered trajectories consisted of multiobjective optimized CCOs based on the optimal control theory, using the pseudospectral direct numerical method. These scenarios allowed addressing of the incremental variations of CCOs versus conventional departures, through fast time simulation, with the objective to assess the effects on the operations.