Colloquium: Ole de Koning (C&O)

20 January 2025 13:00 - Location: Lecture Hall D, FACULTY OF AEROSPACE ENGINEERING, KLUYVERWEG 1, DELFT | Add to my calendar

Trajectory optimisation for contrail avoidance of hydrogen-powered aircraft

The climate goals of the aviation industry raise the question what the most effective strategies are to reduce the climate impact of this hard-to-abate sector. Trajectory optimisation for contrail avoidance can be applied in the short-term and can contribute to short-term climate impact reduction as well. But for conventional aircraft, reducing contrails is always at the cost of increasing CO2 emissions, which have a more significant climate impact on longer time horizons. What would happen then, if similar trajectory optimisation strategies would be applied to future hydrogen-powered aircraft, which do not emit CO2? This question is not easily answered at this stage, as hydrogen-powered aircraft are only just being developed. But focusing on this question now can contribute to our understanding of the impact that these aircraft could have on the aviation sector, and could possibly even help to steer design choices to lower the climate impact of these future aircraft further.

Supervisor: Junzi Sun