Aviation and the Global Atmosphere

Aviation and the Global Atmosphere
Aviation and the Global Atmosphere
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9.3. Historical, Present-Day, and 2015 Forecast Emissions Inventories
Other reports in this collection
Studies on the effects of CO 2 emissions from aircraft on radiative forcing require only a knowledge of total emissions. However, to examine the potential effects of
other emissions from aviation (e.g., those considered in Chapter 4), estimates of the amount and the distribution of emissions are required. Such 3-D inventories for
present and projected future aviation operations have been produced under the aegis of NASA's Atmospheric Effects of Aviation Project (AEAP), the European Civil
Aviation Conference's ANCAT and EC Emissions Inventory Database Group (EIDG), and DLR.
These inventories consist of calculated aircraft emissions distributed over the world's airspace by
latitude, longitude,and altitude. Historical inventories of aviation emissions have been produced
for 1976 and 1984 by NASA. Present-day and 2015 forecast inventories (where present-day is
taken to be the most recent available-1991-92) have been produced by NASA, ANCAT, and
DLR. DLR has also produced emissions inventories of scheduled international aviation only for
each year from 1982 through 1992, and for total scheduled aviation for 1986 and 1989. DLR has
also constructed a four-dimensional (4-D) inventory with diurnal cycles for scheduled aviation in
March 1992.
All of the aforementioned 3-D emissions inventories have a common approach of combining a
database of global air traffic (fleet mix, city-pairs served, and flight frequencies) with a set of
assumptions about flight operations (flightprofiles and routing) and a method to calculate altitudedependent
emissions of aircraft/engine combinations in the fleet. Figure 9-5 shows how these
processes are combined.
ll of the historical, present-day, and 2015 forecast inventories considered in this section assume
idealized flight routings and profiles, with no winds or system delays. Thus, minimum fuel burn
and emissions possible for each flight operation are implicit, given the onboard load assumed.
Simplifying assumptions for military operations vary according to aircraft type.
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