Juan J. Alonso

Stanford

A System-Level View of Alternatives for Improved Fuel Burn of Commercial Aviation

 

Abstract

With the perspective of 20-30 years into the future, we have a number of approaches at our disposal that, today, can be used to significantly improve the fuel burn (and thus the climate impact) of commercial aviation: improved airframe and engine technologies, new aircraft concepts, alternative fuels, efficient operations, and even looking at the design of aircraft mission specifications in a different way.  Often, many of these approaches are not considered because of significant uncertainties, lack of knowledge about system-level impacts, and real-life difficulties resulting from the transition from one paradigm to the next.  This talk focuses on the potential for both aircraft technologies and changes in the design mission specifications of future aircraft.  Scenarios for future technology improvements and their impact on resized/redesign aircraft are discussed.  In addition, designing aircraft differently, while accounting for the system-level implications and economic impacts of such choices is also discussed.  The combination is a possible way to ameliorate the uncertainties present in technology forecasting 20-30 years into the future.

Biography

Juan J. Alonso is an associate professor in the Department of Aeronautics & Astronautics at Stanford University. He joined the faculty in 1997 shortly after receiving a PhD degree in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering from Princeton University. He is the founder and director of the Aerospace Design Laboratory (ADL) where he specializes in the development of high-fidelity computational design methodologies to enable the creation of realizable and efficient aerospace systems. During the period spanning August 2006-October 2008, Prof. Alonso was the Director of the NASA Fundamental Aeronautics Program in Washington, DC.  In that position he was responsible for the portfolio of aerospace vehicle and vehicle technology research for the agency in the subsonic rotary wing, subsonic fixed wing, supersonic, and hypersonic regimes, with particular emphasis on the energy and fuel efficiency and sufficiency of the aviation enterprise and its environmental impact.  He is the recipient of several awards and fellowships including being a three-consecutive-time recipient of the AIAA Best Paper Award in Multi-Disciplinary Optimization, the NASA 2009 Exceptional Public Service Medal, the Stanford Chapter AIAA Professor of the Year Award (7-time recipient), the Ray Grimm Memorial Prize in Computational Physics, and the Terman and Princeton University Honorific fellowships. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Aeronautics & Astronautics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT 1991) where he was a member of the team that currently holds the world speed record for human powered vehicles over water. Prof. Alonso currently serves in the the FAA Management Advisory Council, the Center for Turbulence Research Steering Committee, the DLR Advisory Board, and the FAA Office of Environment & Energy REDAC. He has also served in the NASA Advisory Council (Aeronautics Committee), the VAATE Steering Committee, the Fixed Wing Vehicle Executive Council, and, more recently (2010), he was a member of the Secretary of Transportation’s Future of Aviation Advisory Council.