Environmental impact assessment of commercial aircraft operations in the United States

The objective of this thesis was to evaluate the environmental trade-offs inherent in multi-criteria objectives of an integrated environmental policy. A probabilistic multi-attribute impact pathway analysis (MAIPA) was formulated to assess the environmental damages of US commercial aircraft operations from 1991-2003. The initial contribution of this work was demonstrating the feasibility of, and identifying requirements for, the FAA Aviation-environmental Portfolio Management Tool (APMT), an integrated assessment capability for US regulatory decision-making. Non-aircraft sources have been found to dictate marginal emissions costs. The implication is that aviation emissions reductions influence neither the magnitudes nor trends in per-unit marginal damages. In contrast, noise mitigation is the dominant influence on the value of per-unit marginal damages. Trends in sum damages were found to depend on the growth rates of air transport relative to other source emissions. Growth in air transport emissions outpaced non-aircraft sources from 1991-2003. Because growth in marginal costs is nonlinear over this period, aviation emissions damages grow faster than inventories. Applying methods similar to MAIPA to estimate damages for future scenarios suggests that stemming climate impacts is fast becoming the priority. A reassessment of the environmental benefits derived from mandated phase-outs of noisy aircraft during the 1990's has been carried out. Previous studies estimated a -80% reduction in population exposure. In contrast, the reassessment estimates a ~2% reduction, providing benefits 17-20 times lower than published estimates of abatement costs.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2009

Author dc:creator

• Lukachko, Stephen P. (Stephen Paul)

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Ian A. Waitz.

• Aeronautics and Astronautics.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/54607

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/54607