A collaborative study between Regional & City Airports (RCA), travel company TUI and Cranfield University is investigating how to reduce the environmental impact of aircraft turnarounds at airports.
By analysing different elements of TUI aircraft turnarounds at RCA-owned Exeter airport, experts from Cranfield University’s Centre for Air Transport Management aim to create an ‘emissions inventory’ of ground operations from which improvements can be identified.
Professor Anna Smallwood, head of the centre for air transport management, Cranfield University, described the collaboration as “an excellent example of industry and academia working together” to initiate changes in an area currently underserved by research.
Noting the project’s place in Regional & City Airport’s intentions to make its own operations net zero by 2040, Andy Bell, chief executive of RCA, added how he looks forward to seeing how the findings could ultimately be implemented across the group’s wider airport estate.
Information arising from the ‘living laboratory’ at Exeter airport over the coming months may lead to a number of potential implementable mitigations including the use of electric and alternatively fuelled airside assets and other operational measures. The study is expected to report back next year.