Gustaf Solveling, a PhD student in the Stewart School of Industrial and Systems Engineering (ISyE), has been awarded first place in the eighth annual Joseph A. Hartman Student Paper Competition for his paper titled, “Scheduling of Runway Operations for Reduced Environmental Impact."  Solveling was honored for his work at the PARTNER (the Partnership for Air, Transportation, Noise, and Emissions Reduction) advisory board meeting on March 28, 2012 in Washington, D.C., where he gave a presentation of his paper submission. 

Solveling is co-advised by Ellis Johnson, Coca-Cola Chair and professor in ISyE, and John-Paul Clarke, an associate professor in the Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering with a courtesy appointment in ISyE.

Solveling’s abstract reads:

Efficient runway operations are a necessary input for the optimal use of the air transportation system. Most efforts at improving runway efficiency have failed to capture the impact of environmental costs. Here we develop an integrated approach that models this complex relationship, and provides insights regarding the value of environmental optimization for runway scheduling. More specifically, using actual flight data we compare environmentally optimal schedules with first-come-first-serve based policies and fuel-optimal schedules.  We determine that while significant savings in environmental costs can be achieved through environmentally optimal schedules, these savings are not very different than those obtained through fuel-optimal schedules.  Further, we find that any increase in the operational costs of airlines due to an environmentally optimal schedule is minimal.

The PARTNER Hartman Paper Competition is open to undergraduate and graduate students world-wide, and seeks to capture the best ideas concerning technical solutions, economic analyses, methodologies, and processes that work towards reducing aviation noise and emissions exposure through source reduction technologies, alternative fuels, operating procedures, compatible land use management, and policy implementation.  The Competition is named in memory of Professor Joseph A. Hartman of Boise University, a founding PARTNER member and a lead investigator, who passed away in 2004.

PARTNER, a leading aviation cooperative research organization, is sponsored by the FAA, NASA, Transport Canada, the U.S. Department of Defense, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.  PARTNER research fosters advances in alternative fuels, emissions, noise, operations, aircraft technologies, and science and decision-making for the betterment of mobility, economy, national security, and the environment. The organization's operational headquarters is at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

For More Information Contact

Barbara ChristopherIndustrial and Systems Engineering404.385.3102