Is SESAR doing what the airlines intended?

Exclusive interview with Dr. Henning Hartmann

Today we bring you an exclusive interview with Dr. Henning Hartmann, who was, during the SESAR Definition Phase with Lufthansa German Airlines and representing the Airspace Users, he was also the person responsible for the development of the SESAR Concept of Operations (ConOps). He will give us his views on what SESAR is to-day as he sees it and explains why there is cause for some concern.
Henning can you give our readers an impression of what you are feeling today when looking at SESAR and the SESAR Joint Undertaking (SJU) as they are now?
In order to understand my arguments concerning today’s situation, I’ll first have a closer look at the situation as it was during the definition phase.
The SESAR Definition Phase was a multi-stakeholder project consisting of 6 milestones which delivered 6 documents each of which was subject to agreement by the stakeholders. The SESAR Concept of Operations was part of deliverable 3, entitled “The ATM Target System”. It was seen as the driving engine of the future system and consequently to some extent the development process of the concept was THE culmination point of the diverging views of the different stakeholders. Obviously, in the end all stakeholders had to compromise to some extent.
Why did these different views come up?
It makes a huge difference “how” a system is operated and since I was representing the Airspace Users, the Airspace Users operational concept vision did not come up just by accident. It was the result of a structured process reflecting all types of Airspace Users.
Before going to the different views, it is essential to understand how the vision of the Airspace Users was constructed: we looked 15 years ahead, we did analyse different passenger segmentation forecasts and their needs and preferences and how the airlines could respond (in terms of the operational context) to those passenger needs.

This development was a strictly top down approach, the reasoning based firmly on the service chain. In this approach the passenger (according to the forecast data) is requesting a service from the airline and subsequently the airline requests a specific service from an ANSP. Then, to highlight the business link even stronger, if operational circumstances permit to the airline will want to choose from different services (with different cost levels) offered by the ANSP.
Crucial for this approach was the link in reasoning from the business level down toward the operational level (and supported and assured by certain features of the underlying technical level).
Airlines operate in a competitive environment, so the main driver was not only the slashing of the unit cost. Equally important was the opportunity of the Airspace User to choose between different kinds of services (provided by their current ANSP) as a perfect means to differentiate their product from their competitors. Furthermore this operational capability opens up the opportunity to offer completely new products to the passenger for even more pronounced differentiation and even more competition in the market concerned.
What does this mean for the operation of the ATM network?
For nominal situations i.e. when everything is executed the way it was planned Airspace Users and ANSPs are in a good shape. However the real world is not that perfect and the non-nominal situations are making the difference.
The Airspace User ConOps did also envisage more control by them in non-nominal situations.
The background to this is that in non-nominal situations the airlines are already facing a loss and they will seek (according to their airline-wide operational abilities and according to the prevailing operational circumstances of the airline and the flight concerned) to minimise this loss.
Since even a single aircraft has effects on the operation of the network of a given carrier, the Airspace Users wanted to have maximum control over this (and all other) flights operated by them. The link from the business environment in terms of cost to the control of the fleet to the control of the single flight via the control of the trajectory was established and the name business trajectory was born in order to express this business-operational link. What is more, on the original concept the Airspace User was the “owner” of this business trajectory expressing that he generates a new trajectory, preferably on the flight deck, to ensure optimum flight performance.

From an airline perspective the aircraft/pilot (backed by the AOC) is still the link to the ANSP, where the aircraft has access to the operational status of the whole fleet (as the highest asset for a network carrier). He can therefore express optimal performance from network/fleet perspective as well as from a flight performance perspective.
The “Management by Constraints” principle was the means to handle this operational freedom towards the ANSP, which assigned a clear role to the ANSP as being this “Constraint Manager”. This means that if necessary, but only then, the ANSP issues a constraint, whereupon the Airspace User (pilot and /or airline ops centre depending on the severity of the situation) decides (taking into account the operational situation of the fleet) HOW to meet this constraint. Thereafter, a new trajectory is generated, again preferably on the flight deck. The ANSP would have liked to take over this decision (not only because it would make their lives easier), however in the SESAR ConOps this remained an Airspace User decision. Management by Constraints is the most powerful and strongest means to ensure operational freedom and to introduce flexibility into the business level of the airline operation.
Are there other Airspace User assets than “Management by Constraint”?
Well, the User Defined Prioritisation Process (UDPP) is another powerful means expressing that Airspace Users have control over their flights. Initially it was called “Scarce Resource Function” which clearly said there was a scarce resource (e.g. capacity) to deal with, however in the “agreement process” it was renamed to UDPP. If for example we come back to non-nominal situations and furthermore if the non-nominal situation is exacerbated in cases where the declared capacity is dramatically decreasing, where dramatically means that Aircraft cannot be “shifted” on the time scale to cope with this decrease but have to be diverted, it is the Airspace User who decides who is using this scarce resource in the broadest sense and not the ANSP who decides between push and punish. This reduction decision may be solved initially within the fleet, however if this is not sufficient it may be extended to other airlines who decide among themselves who may use this resource (and how to compensate in business terms).
The scarce resource problem could be for example an ATM sector as well as an Airport which has to reduce inbound flow (due to bad weather for instance) and this was applicable in the short term (as described above) as well as the medium and long term planning phases. The short term is the most dynamic and hence the most challenging one.
By the way this Airspace User ConOps was agreed by all the airlines participating in the SESAR definition phase and in a second step by all the airlines operating world-wide and represented in the IATA/AEA Joint Users Requirements Group (JURG). To me this was a very strong signal towards the ANSPs, showing clearly what the Airsapce Users want and expect!
So how was this situation resolved with the ANSPs ?
As mentioned above, the SESAR ConOps was an agreed document, so when the Airspace User ConOps was facing the ANSP ConOps, the ANSPs claimed doing “everything” for the Airspace Users however the ANSPs managed to engraft “exceptions to above rules”.
Where are these core concept elements now? Sure in the SJU ConOps the Airspace User assets are still present, it would be hard to justify – while staying within the ATM service chain- the Airspace User requests are not being responded to (especially with the ANSPs still claiming doing “everything” for the Airspace Users), but… The Airspace User assets have been given a very low priority and hence were pushed way towards the right (the future). The result is that now the “exceptions to the rule” are prevailing.
Do you have an example for this exception to the rule?
Sure. ANSPs are in favour of the time control concept. Time control translates into speed control of a single aircraft and ANSPs prefer to uplink this ground generated trajectory in order to avoid separation infringements.
The aircraft models used by ANSPs to generate the trajectory may evolve over time, however they will never reach the accuracy and performance of a flight deck generated trajectory – and here you can also see why flight performance and consequently fuel saving issues are going into the background and why the term business trajectory is vanishing. Since trajectory based operations are not the primary goal any more (they are the SJU ConOps’ 2nd step) nobody would realise in directly comparing and contrasting the flight deck trajectory with the ground based trajectory that the latter is not reaching the flight deck performance (and consequently the flight efficiency and the highly valued “business link” also suffer). The SJU ConOps took a different road: the ATM system is evolving from the time based approach (SJU ConOps’ 1st step) namely the ground generated trajectory to the trajectory based approach. This will (as models improve) improve the performance (and you can measure this performance increase) but by definition it will never reach the flight deck generated performance levels. What a quick win you might say…

You can follow this change from SESAR ConOps to SJU ConOps if you look at the twist in the definitions: In the SESAR ConOps the Business trajectory’s full potential unfolds during the day of operation however the SJU ConOps uses this term only in the pre-day of operation context connotated with the secret message : on the day of operation, the ownership is NOT with the Airspace User any more. There are other examples where people can observe these slight twists in definition which make a huge difference at the end.
Even at large scale there is a similar situation: It is no secret any more that mandates are on their way to enforce Airlines to downlink their status data for the ANSP to generate the trajectory which should be generated and executed on flight deck in the Flight Management System. At the end of the agreement phase of the ATM Target Concept document I issued a showstopper on this aircraft derived data case, however it was voted down at the SESAR executive committee. From Airspace User perspectivethe reasoning behind that decision was simply that the airlines are better off if they renounce these quick wins and go directly to the trajectory based concept. In the longer run, those quick wins are no wins at all and the operational and business control has much higher value and hence must have priority. Unfortunately, the attraction of quick wins at the expense of longer term, more valuable benefits, was apparently too strong and the short sighted approach prevails.
Henning you are using the term ConOps in different contexts, as if there were several of those things. Can you explain the differences between them?
Yes, with pleasure. As I said earlier, the SESAR definition phase was a multi-stakeholder project with, naturally, different stakeholder views. So, the ConOps context can be defined according to content depending on stakeholder-specific details as well as the content evolution along the time-line of the reconciliation process. At the beginning, there were two major ConOps versions. One developed by the Airspace Users containing the business link and other very innovative elements and thinking. This was in contrast with the ANSP developed ConOps and, truth be told, it was also opposed to some extent by the ANSPs. This ANSP ConOps had, in my view, legacy thinking prevailing in it.
At the end of the two year definition phase, the SESAR ConOps was born which was the product of a reconciliation process…
But you mentioned also the term “SJU concept”… how does this term fit into the ConOps time-line?
OK, let me try to explain. The “SESAR ConOps” is the name given to the official product of the original SESAR consortium. That consortium has now evolved into the SESAR Joint Undertaking (SJU) where they still call the ConOps by the same name (SESAR ConOps), even though it is being further refined.  However, I prefer to call this the SJU ConOps.
You see, at the top level there is no framework any more that would argue for the Airspace User business and operational assets, that would challenge the ANSP course of action in terms of process, operational content, sequence or priorities in introducing the assets.

In short, in the current all important phase of SESAR, the Airspace Users (who are the financing organisation and THE main users of the forthcoming products) are no longer in the driver’s seat when it comes to the innovative elements of the future ATM system. This is in stark contrast to what was the case in the definition phase.
Even though the official SJU terminology talks about this phase as a period of administrative set-up, those familiar with what is going on share my view that during the 3 three years of this “administrative” set-up, the main pillars of the basic long-term strategy has shifted decisively towards the ANSP ConOps.
Do I hear a bit of disappointment in your voice?
No, not at all.
At the end of the day, the underlying process simply reflects the power distribution here in Europe. There are other examples highlighting this. For example, the Airspace Users are forced to transmit the extended squitter message but ANSPs are not forced to use it, or if you go to the world-wide level, the ICAO ATM concept states that the pre-determined separator is the pilot, yet in Europe this is ignored and the ANSP remains the separator.
I simply highlighted the values of the concept of operations proposed by the Airspace Users and contrasted this with the ANSP ConOps which was in the end subsumed into the SESAR ConOps… I had to highlight also the ongoing emphasis shift to the SJU ConOps which still differs (from the Airspace User perspective on basic definitions) from the ICAO ConOps – and this is speaking volumes.
But it seems that the airlines are happy with this situation and process.
I do not understand why the Airspace Users are diverting from those important basic and agreed principles of the Airspace User ConOps. I have not heard or seen any justification that would give sufficient reason for them to act this way, so I have to conclude simply that they have a different focus and are not fully aware of what is going on..
During the SESAR definition phase, there were 600 experts with 10% Airspace User contributing to this project. Now in the SJU development phase there were 3000 experts involved however the Airspace User contribution went down to 3%, and without exception core work packages are now under non-Airspace User control.
Even worse, from the Airspace Users side continuity is not ensured since 90% of the Airspace User experts went to other tasks and no longer have any links to the Airspace Users ConOps. Those involved now are ill equipped to even recognise, let alone to value and safeguard those all important assets that have been agreed on a world-wide basis.
Once again, Airspace Users involved in the SESAR Development Phase conduct their work more in a reactive than in a proactive way, coping with their day-to-day business dictated by the SJU work schedule.
Finally there is another remarkable thing: looking from outside into the SJU process, to me there is an overwhelming harmony, in contrast to the definition phase where there was an ubiquitous (and fruitful) tension in the discussions and those issues not being reconciled had to escalate up to the executive committee for decision. This tension is gone ! How come ? It is simply not life-like and realistic…
To me there is just another indication and finally my take away from this interview.
Three years of SJU ConOps development speaks a crystal clear language: The ATM system development process is now simply going down the ANSP road where we can expect an improved version of the already known ANSP product with no major innovation for the Airspace Users as defined in the SESAR ConOps of the definition phase…
The Airspace Users case has been side-stepped in a brilliant way and they are back in the 90s….