CORUS-XUAM is a two-year very large-scale demonstration (VLD) project that will demonstrate how U-space services and solutions could support integrated Urban Air Mobility (UAM) flight operations. These services should allow electric vertical take-off and landing vehicles (eVTOL), unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) and other airspace users (unmanned and manned) to operate safely, securely, sustainably and efficiently in a controlled and fully integrated airspace, without undue impact on operations currently managed by ATM.

The activities will start with updating the U-space Concept of Operations to address the integration of UAM/UAS operations into the airspace, and identifying new U3/U4 services. This will be followed by the preparation and execution of six challenging demonstration campaigns in Belgium, France, Germany/UK, Italy, Spain, and Sweden.

The CORUS-XUAM project is being undertaken by the same consortium as delivered the CORUS U-space Concept of Operations in 2019, again coordinated by the EUROCONTROL Innovation Hub, and has now been extended by the addition of UAM expertise. It now includes partners from the leading innovative research arms of the ATM, UAS and UAM industries. The project is a part of the European Union/SESAR Joint Undertaking Horizon 2020 programme.

Project Highlights

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Challenges

U-space and the integration of UAM into low-level airspace will undergo rapid research, innovation and implementation in the short and medium terms. Europe intends to be at the forefront of developing early solutions to support this fast-growing industry. A harmonised approach is essential.

UAM will enable on-demand, highly automated, passenger or cargo-carrying air transport services especially in urban and sub-urban environments, using electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft together with new concepts, technologies, airspace management constructs/procedures, and regulations. New stakeholders will perform sustainable operations that are interoperable with manned and unmanned aviation as well as with current ATM operations.

Benefits of CORUS-XUAM

The UAM challenges can only be met through an evolutionary development process ensuring the definition of appropriate, advanced and interoperable U-space infrastructure, technologies, traffic management capabilities and new set of advanced services that fit with the expected types of operation and levels of demand.

The project aims to highlight the importance of U-space solutions for integrated operations that require mutual situational awareness of traffic. It will demonstrate integrated operations of both manned and unmanned aircraft employing advanced U-space services and will explore ways to facilitate a proper interface with ATM/ANS (air navigation services), with a particular focus on airport operations.

This will support the European Commission’s vision for the safe, secure, integrated, and efficient handling of drone and UAM traffic operations and will be a key enabler for the growing drone market to generate economic and social benefits

Large-scale Demonstrations

Six very large-scale demonstration (VLD) activities are at the heart of CORUS-XUAM and will validate integrated operations of UAS/UAM and manned aircraft, and advanced forms of interaction through digital data exchange supported by integrated and advanced U-space services in urban, sub-urban, and inter-city scenarios as well as in and near ATM-controlled airspaces and airports. The VLDs will focus on different types of mission such as passenger transport, delivery, emergency response and surveillance.

The VLDs will use different U-space deployment architectures and state-of-the-art technologies. They will consider coordination between ATC and U-space, including interaction with ATCOs and pilots. The VLDs will combine flights by eVTOLs with other traffic, and operations in the CTRs of major airports. Vertiport procedures, separation, and data services will be also demonstrated.

This validation is focused on developing guidelines for safe UAM operations at urban ports, in particular in the urban areas around the Ports of Zeebruges and Antwerp. Ports are one of the critical infrastructures that benefit the most from the use of drones, and the Belgian VLD tests the two main applications of these technologies in the port environment: surveillance and infrastructure-inspection operations. Making maximum use of 5G, the demonstration plans to provide surveillance and first response images to the city-infrastructure management centres. Additionally, the ports are located close to the international airports of Ostend and Antwerp, enabling interoperability solutions between ATM and U-space to be tested.

The focus here is the demonstration of the feasibility and benefits of interconnecting airports and city vertiports via UAM for transporting people and goods. The validation will bring together a wide variety of UAM players involved in the target scenario, including Aéroports de Paris (ADP), Paris mobility provider RATP, and Skyports (a vertiport infrastructure developer). Three technical areas will be specifically addressed: a dynamic U-space airspace configuration, trajectory conformity monitoring and the operational guidelines for UAM vertiports operations. For this, the French demonstration will explore a broad range of technologies for communication between drones and U-space traffic management services (such as VHF, SATCOM, 4G and ADS-B). ADS-Broadcast technology is also exploited for its primary purpose as a dependent surveillance information source, to build a picture of traffic information. The validation scenarios include all necessary procedures for the safe integration of vertiports in an urban environment: emergency landing, security and safety processes, boarding/disembarkation of passengers, recharging/ maintenance, and integrated flight and mission planning. This demonstration forms part of the preparation of UAM for 2024 Olympic Games.

The main goal this validation, executed simultaneously in Germany & UK, is the optimisation of urban flight route structures from airport to city metropolitan area. Of special interest is having business aspects such as on-time departure/arrival to link with commercial flights and efficiency of routes within congested urban airspace taken into account. The interaction with Helicopter Emergency Medical Services (HEMS) operations will also be studied to address prioritisation in conflict management. Urban locations to be used as reference are within the controlled airspace areas (CTR) of Frankfurt Airport (Germany) and London City and London Heathrow Airports (UK). Interaction between ATM and U-space, and integration of UAS into existing ATM structures will be extensively tested. This VLD addresses the use of diverse surveillance technologies such as Primary Radar (PR), ADS-B, FLARM and SSR Mode S in detail.

The demonstration, led by the Italian Air Navigation Service Provider ENAV jointly with the Italian U-space Service Provider D-Flight and conducted with the support of the Distretto Tecnologico Aerospaziale (DTA), NAIS and the UAM Operator Pipistrel Vertical Solutions, focuses on guidelines for safe depot-to-depot operations between two logistics centres within a suburban area. Flight tests, with involvement of a fast UAM vehicle and other drones for specific operations, will take place at Grottaglie-Taranto civil experimental airport, allowing the involvement of an ATM component and the demonstration of coordination and interoperability between ATM and U-space for the management of UAM traffic. This VLD addresses a UAM-tailored performance framework including safety, access and equity, cyber security and human performance, measured through humans-in-the-loop assessment, such as ATCOs and pilots, during the demonstration.

The Spanish validation will look deeper into the interrelations between UAM operations, urban restrictions and intermodality links. The scenarios chosen to do this aim to reproduce the door-to-door transport of goods in a residential area close to the beach at Castelldefels, a mid-size municipality within the CTR of Barcelona airport. Logistics operations will coexist with law enforcement surveillance and emergency actions. To test the full complexity of strategic de-confliction and tactical conflict resolution in an urban CTR environment, the network of services deployed by this demonstration will include operation plan preparation/optimisation and processing/reconciling both the flight and mission-drone operator requirements, geo-fencing, weather, collaborative interface with ATC, tracking and surveillance data exchange. Business needs and interconnection with other transport modes will necessitate de-confliction of flights departing from a logistics hub to execute diverse city missions. This VLD will also deploy two possible U-space architectures: one with a federated network of U-space service providers (USP) plus an inter-USP platform; and another where a Central Information System (CIS) serves critical services to connected USPs.
The Swedish validation will undertake fully autonomous intercity flights between the Linköping municipality and Norrköping Airport (two Swedish sites around 50 km apart). Real test flights will be merged with simulated traffic to demonstrate the capability of combined U-space services and on-drone Detect and Avoid (DAA), to safely de-conflict the route of autonomous eVTOL flights. ADS-B will be used for surveillance for compatibility with manned aviation at the airport, and to ensure a smooth transition between ATM and U-space. The flight route will follow paths over inter-municipality roads. Especially for long-range drone flights as in these scenarios, vertiports are considered key points for fuelling (electric or hydrogen), information collection and provision – e.g. nowcast weather – or emergency landing.

Project Partners

The EUROCONTROL Innovation Hub in Brétigny, France is coordinating the project, managed by the SESAR Joint Undertaking and funded within the framework of Horizon Europe 2020, which involves 19 partners and 11 related third parties: Groupe Aéroports de Paris, AOPA UK, ASLOGIC, DFS, DLR, Droniq GmbH, DSNA, ENAIRE, ENAV, HEMAV, INDRA, LFV Group, NATS, Pipistrel VS, SkeyDrone, Unifly nv, Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Volocopter, M3 Systems, Ehang Holding GmbH, Hologarde, CRIDA, D-FLIGHT, NAIS, DTA, IBG, Linköping University, Citymesh, SABCA.

Preparatory work and flight trials will be performed throughout 2021 and 2022. Insights and recommendations gained from the project will be compiled in a final report on early U-space solutions for UAM deployment in late 2022, and are also expected to be used by regulatory authorities.

Advisory Board

A project advisory board with a broad range of stakeholders as well as a larger U-space community network is helping the consortium consolidate the proposed U-space services and the relevant concept of operations.