A multi-disciplinary team of researchers from the University of Cambridge Institute for Aviation and the Environment (IAE) have been awarded funding of £760k by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) to examine the impact of aviation on the global and local atmosphere.

Economic development, increasing global linkages, and steadily declining airfares have made air travel the sector of fastest growth amongst all transportation modes. As a result, emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases and precursors have continued to increase strongly.

Whilst previous efforts to evaluate the impact have focused on either the socio-economic causes or environmental consequences of aviation, this three-year project will combine world-leading expertise at Cambridge in both areas by integrating research in the disciplines of socio-economics, aircraft technology, and atmospheric science.

Evaluating the real cost of air travel

Dr Andreas Schäfer of the Department of Architecture, Principal Investigator on the successful grant application, said: “This project will represent a whole range of economic, engineering and atmospheric processes into a linked quantitative model”.

“This has never been attempted before, but is vital if we are to take a truly integrated approach to designing strategies for technology and operations that will significantly reduce the environmental impact of aviation in the future.”

Under the auspices of the IAE, researchers in the departments of Architecture, Chemistry, Engineering, Economics, Geography and Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics will build a computer model to predict travel demand, airport congestion, aircraft movements and emissions, global climate impacts, and near-airport air pollution over the next 100 years.

When completed, the integrated assessment model will help analyse the effect of a wide range of air transport-related policies on the environment, including potential economic, operational, and technological impacts.

“This funding provides a tremendous opportunity to capitalize on the wide-ranging and internationally respected expertise in our group,” said Professor Peter Haynes, Acting Director of the IAE. “It will allow us to build a significant coordinated research effort to address the extremely challenging problems that are posed by increasing air transport and increasing environmental impact'.

The Institute for Aviation and the Environment (IAE) was launched in December 2004 following knowledge transfer funding from the Natural Environment Research Council.

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