Daniel BODMER, Jacob JÄSCHKE, Florian LINKE, Volker GOLLNICK
DOI Number: XXX-YYY-ZZZ
Conference number: HiSST 2024-00116
In atmospheric physics, the impact of gaseous engine emissions on climate is quantified using complex 3D simulations, which are computationally intensive and consequently require a long simulation time. Since climate impact depends on the time and locus of an emission, especially with respect to the non-CO2 effects such as NOx emissions, climate-optimized flight trajectories might be higher (or lower) than emission-optimized flight trajectories. This paper aims to present a methodology for deriving the minimum nitrogen oxide (NOx) or water vapor (H2O) trajectory of hydrogen-powered hypersonic aircraft taking into account realistic operational constraints such as tolerable passenger loads as well as the sonic-boom carpet propagation. The methodology is demonstrated using the civil Mach 8 waverider reference configuration STRATOFLY-MR3, which yields significant mitigation potential for both NOx and H2O emissions along the aircraft’s 4D-trajectory by varying the cruise flight altitude. The obtained results can be used as a simplified metric for climate impact predictions at stratospheric altitudes and are expressed as relative changes with respect to the aircraft’s design criteria defined in the H2020 project STRATOFLY. Results are presented for a global fleet of 200 MR3 aircraft operating 360 days per year on the design route from Brussels to Sydney. As a scientific contribution, emission inventories for the optimized mission scenario will be produced and made publicly available.