Rapid Integrated Interdependent Fleet-Level Environmental Model

Abstract

The reduction of fleetwide environmental impacts through vehicle technologies and concepts is a global imperative. Fleet-level environmental impact modeling is governed by computational resource limitations and the tradeoff between breadth and depth. Unlike screening fidelity models, detailed models typically cannot support probabilistic analysis of forecast parameters (i.e., operations, fleet mix, technology-aircraft market penetration, etc.) due to their high run time. Moreover, both levels of fidelity currently rely on the selection of a small set of point-design technology aircraft, disabling the ability to assess technology-aircraft environmental performance and forecast parameters simultaneously. In this paper, a rapid, integrated, and interdependent fleet-level environmental modeling framework that addresses these shortcomings is presented. The model consists of several screening fidelity modeling enablers developed in prior work, combined with parameterized joint probability distributions to bridge the gap between aircraft and fleet-level probabilistic assessment. Copulas are used to enforce a prescribed dependence between two probability distributions and facilitate the characterization of complex and uncertain interactions in fleet-level assessment. This paper explains the building blocks of the framework in detail, followed by their conceptual structuring. Finally, notional simplified use cases of the model are presented to demonstrate the different types of interdependencies that can be assessed probabilistically.