GE to Help AAI Accelerate Deployment of RNP
US aerospace firm, GE Aviation will be providing technical support to the Airports Authority of India (AAI) – the country’s air navigation service provider – to accelerate the deployment of the Required Navigation Performance (RNP) flight paths nationwide.
And the American firm and AAI would work together through a US Trade and Development Agency grant to deploy the efficient procedures at the Bangalore, Mangalore and Gauhati airports to improve the airspace efficiency, the company said in a release on Tuesday.
GE Aviation will also work with the Director General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) to support RNP operations approval for a domestic airline. Once the flight paths are deployed and in use, a report documenting the actual benefits of the flight paths will be published.
The use of the Required Navigation Performance flight paths is expected to alleviate air traffic congestion and reduce excess fuel burnout, noise levels around airports as well as the flight delays due to increased traffic.“India has more than 50 mid-sized airports, including Mangalore, which could benefit immediately with track mile and fuel savings from RNP,” GE Aviation’s Flight Efficiency Services General Manager Giovanni Spitale said.
“In the longer run, India could realise 80,000 tons of fuel and 2.52 lakh tons of Carbon Dioxide reduced annually by implementing RNP across the country,” Spitale added.
Bangalore is the nation’s fourth busiest airport for overall passenger traffic and may benefit from the capacity improvements promoted by the RNP paths.
The aircraft operating to Gauhati too may benefit from the schedule reliability of the RNP, furthering the economic growth and social inclusion agenda for the region.
“GE is equipped to partner India in the growth of its aviation industry. The RNP will help the industry in enhancing its accuracy and performance by reducing the delay in flights and air traffic congestion,” GE Aviation and Transportation South Asia head Nalin Jain said.
The Performance-based Navigation (PBN) technology allows the pilots to use on board technology to follow a precise track, independent of ground-based navigation beacons that limit where the aircraft can go.
The RNP procedures,which are an advanced form of PBN technology, can be designed to shorten the distance an aircraft has to fly en route, and to reduce fuel burn, exhaust emissions and noise pollution in communities near the airports.