Assessing the Economic and Institutional Impacts Resulting from the Introduction of a Self Separation Operational Concept in Air Traffic Management

摘要

The Self Separation Operational Concept (ConOps) aims to provide a solution to the efficientmanagement of the expected radical increase of air traffic in the forthcoming years. The majorfeatures of this Air Traffic Management (ATM) concept relate to the delegation of the separation taskfrom the Air Traffic Controllers to the flight crew for a defined part of the airspace. A majorprerequisite of the full scale implementation of the self separation concept is the examination of itsinstitutional and economic feasibility. This paper aims to provide the methodological steps for theidentification of the legal and institutional barriers and enablers that may relate to the introduction ofsuch a concept as well as an analysis of its economic viability. The expected outcome of theinstitutional analysis is to determine the changes in the existing institutional framework that mayfacilitate the introduction of the new concept. Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA) is applied for theeconomic appraisal of the ATM changes proposed in the concept. Given that the self separationConOps is in its definition phase, scarcity of cost and benefit data is encountered. A methodologicalframework is proposed for applying the CBA for this type of ATM operational concepts. Applyingthe institutional analysis for Europe indicated that changes in the relevant regulatory frameworkshould be in place in order to deploy the proposed concept. Moreover, exemplary results from theapplication of the proposed CBA framework in Europe encourage the development of the SelfSeparation ConOps to the next maturity stage.