Cockpit automation increases planned for clean sheet narrowbodies

28/11/202504/12/2025 David Learmount Uncategorized A320NEO, advanced materials, Airbus, aircraft, Airports, automation and autonomy, aviation, blended-wing/body, Boeing, ducted fan, ECAM, EICAS, Flight Management Systems, folding wings, higher-bypass, Human-machine teaming, Next Generation Single Aisle, NGSA, open-fan, pilot-assist technologies, pilots in-the-loop, SAF, smart assistant, Sustainable Aviation Fuel, transonic truss-braced wing, unducted fan, Yannick Assouad

Airbus and Boeing are both planning to hit the marketplace with completely new narrobodied aircraft in the mid to late 2030s, but what will they look like? Will they have pilots?

Nothing is set in stone, but it appears most likely that airframes will still be variants of the wing-and-tube format. And, at present, power unit technology is still predicted to be hydrocarbon-fuelled, but using 100% sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) at service entry, driving higher-bypass rotors, whether ducted or unducted, with a promised 20%-30% increase in fuel efficiency. Both manufacturers still promise net-zero emissions by 2050.

Airbus’ NGSA (Next Generation Single Aisle) aircraft is expected to feature long, slender wings with folding wingtips (above), whereas Boeing, working with NASA, is trialling the “transonic truss-braced wing” (see below), also with a very high aspect ratio and folding wingtips

Surprisingly, no-one is talking specifically about artificial intelligence (AI). That may be because, by then, it will be impossible to tell, in integrated aircraft management systems, where AI ends and passive software begins. Meanwhile Airbus and Boeing both say they plan to keep pilots “in the loop”, and in an executive role. At this point a two-pilot crew is the model they are working with, but how long that will remain the status quo is not clear.

France-based Thales, which supplies the integrated modular avionics on the Airbus A320NEO, sees the NGSA offering the flightcrew a high degree of integral assistance.

“That aircraft will incorporate a lot more help for the pilots through automation, or recommendation, so they are assisted at any moment of the flight – whether it is a normal phase or if there are issues,” according to Yannick Assouad, executive VP of the avionics division. Flight management systems will assist pilot decision-making, going further than today’s Airbus Electronic Centralised Aircraft Monitor (ECAM) system or Boeing’s Engine Indicating and Crew Alerting System (EICAS), by proposing solutions with supporting information, but leaving the decision to the pilots.

If there is a difference between the two manufacturers’ approaches to future flight deck systems human/machine interface, it is subtle. Boeing emphasises pilot-assist technologies designed to keep the pilot central while improving training, and “human-machine teaming”, whereas Airbus focuses on automation and autonomy to reduce workload and improve safety through use of assistance systems. Airbus talks of “making the aircraft the pilot’s smart assistant”, one that can anticipate and act.

Technology advances include more efficient, higher bypass engines, including open fan designs; long, high aspect-ratio foldable wings enabling significant aerodynamic efficiency gains while maintaining manoeuvrability during taxiing and docking at high density airports; also, next-generation batteries to enable hybrid architectures where electricity is increasingly used to support propulsive and non-propulsive functions aboard the aircraft, and increased use of advanced lightweight materials and integrated systems.

Contrail cure? Nearly…

08/06/2024 David Learmount Uncategorized A350-900, Airbus, aviation, carbon dioxide, clean-burn, Climate change, Covid 19 pandemic, Dassault Falcon 20, fossil-fuel, global warming, SAF, soot particles, sustainability, Sustainable Aviation Fuel

Having recently revealed in Learmount.com that air travel could easily be rendered less of a global-warmer than it is (see previous article Airline climate harm can be halved), another significant discovery enabling further advances on that front has just been chalked up.

Sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), if used at 100% concentration rather than a mix of about 50% with fossil-derived aviation fuel, appears to be able to reduce – by more than half – the global warming effects of high level cirrus cloud formed from persistent aircraft contrails.

Use of SAF is, at present, the most tangible action airlines can take to reduce their global warming effect, although its production is nowhere near sufficient to power the entire world fleet. Deriving from waste vegetable oil and production processes that consume global warming gases, its sustainability is its most obvious benefit. It is turning out, however, also to have unpredicted advantages, like a higher energy output per unit weight as well as a much cleaner burn.

This clean-burn effect has come to light as a result of trials conducted by Airbus, using one of its A350-900s, fueled with 100% SAF and cruising at 35,000ft over the Mediterranean Sea, trailed by a Dassault Falcon 20 chase aircraft carrying out contrail sampling. The trial has found that burning 100% SAF produces 35% fewer soot particles per unit burned than normal aviation kerosene, and an even higher reduction in ice particle formation, at 56% less. Visible contrails result from the water produced by fuel combustion condensing on soot or other particles in the atmosphere, and it is when high level aircraft contrails consist of ice particles that they persist longest in the upper atmosphere, creating cirrus cloud that would otherwise not exist.

Air travel has recovered vigorously from the dip experienced as a result of the Covid 19 pandemic. Indeed the pandemic lock-downs seem to have heightened travellers’ desire to fly, so any progress the industry can make toward reducing its climate change effects is more than just desirable, it is essential.

For greater detail on the Airbus trials, and more on the science of contrails, see David Kaminsky Morrow’s article on FlightGlobal.com and the Learmount.com article immediately preceding this one.

The RAF goes green

19/11/2022 David Learmount Uncategorized A330-200, Airbus, Airbus Defence & Space, Brize Norton, Jesus Ruiz, RAF, Rolls-Royce, Royal Air Force, SAF, Sir Mike Wigston, Sustainable Aviation Fuel, tanker/transport, Trent 772B, Voyager

With a 90min Airbus Voyager test flight out of its Brize Norton base, it seems the Royal Air Force has chalked up a world first.

On 16 November the Voyager, the military tanker/transport version of the A330-200, took off with its Rolls-Royce Trent 772B turbofans burning pure, 100% sustainable aviation fuel. Many airlines have operated different types with a mix of standard aviation fuel and SAF – usually less than 50% – but no-one is believed to have used pure SAF before.

On board were an RAF crew supplemented by representatives from the SAF manufacturer BP, Airbus Defence & Space, and engine manufacturer R-R. FlightGlobal has reported a statement by Airbus experimental test pilot Jesus Ruiz, who was the aircraft commander for the test: “From the crew perspective, the SAF operation was ‘transparent’, meaning that no differences were observed operationally. The test plan was exhaustive and robust and has allowed us to compare SAF with JET [A]1.”

RAF Voyager tanker/transport (Crown Copyright)

BP crafted the SAF from used cooking oil. This being a flight operated in British airspace by my alma mater, the RAF, I have an unaccountably earnest desire to learn that the cooking oil came from the deep-fryers of English Fish & Chip bars. Given that Capt Ruiz confirms the flight went without a hitch, it seems BP successfully ensured the fuel was not contaminated with salt and vinegar!

Joking aside, this is a very welcome achievement, as is the RAF’s stated objective for sustainable flight. Chief of the air staff Air Chief Marshal Sir Mike Wigston says the RAF is committed to achieving net-zero air operations by 2040, a decade ahead of the present global aviation target.