A Blog of the ZHAW Zurich University of Applied Sciences
“Achieving sustainability in commercial aviation is difficult, but not impossible. Naturally, engineers try not to create new problems, yet it is important for them to be aware about all factors and influences and not just to focus on solving one issue.” – By D. Romang and C. Waltenspül. As part of their project in AV.PM4, […]
Written by: Thomas Rötger Every three years in February, the UN International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) holds the plenary meeting of its Committee for Aviation Environmental Protection (CAEP). Normally, this meeting gathers about 200 aviation experts representing the States and international organisations at the ICAO Headquarters for two weeks in snowy Montréal. Not surprisingly, the […]
Exactly one year after the first measurements at the Gas Turbine Research Centre (GTRC) in Wales, the second measurement campaign was due there. And just like last year, the situation with the COVID pandemic started to deteriorate dramatically just before our departure. After numerous meetings, discussions and clarifications, including the development of strict COVID protection […]
For a few months now, our group and our students have been doing field measurements using Partector 2, a portable particulate matter (PM) sensor from naneos particle solutions gmbh. This very nice portable device utilizing induced currents (Fierz et al, 2014) measures the lung-deposited surface area (LDSA, see e.g. the paper of Sager & Castranova, […]
Of course, COVID-19 also affected us, leading to working from home, interruption of routine aircraft turbine emission measurements at SR Technics, or to additional workload linked to remote teaching activities. On a positive note, COVID-19 offered the unique situation of drastic reductions in road as well as air traffic. At Zurich airport, there were days […]
On January 13-17, 2020, Julien and I attended the meeting of the SAE E-31 Committee, which took place in the historic Glamorgan Building of Cardiff University (little did I know that it would be the only face-to-face meeting the committee would have this year…). As usual, the first day of the meeting was devoted to […]
If you are going to San Francisco … …make sure your poster tube fits in the overhead bin. On December 7, 2019, I was boarding a flight to San Francisco to attend the AGU Fall Meeting (American Geophysical Union). And judging by the frequent occurrence of poster tubes sticking up in the line of passengers […]
On November 18, 2019, I attended the kickoff meeting of the project RAPTOR (Research of Aviation PM Technologies, Modeling and Regulation) organized by the coordinator ENVISA in Paris. RAPTOR is a part of the European research program Clean Sky funded by the EU’s Horizon 2020 program. The project brings together experts from academia and industry […]
Right after Christmas 2018, our group was approached by a foreign aircraft engine manufacturer who requested us to perform various nvPM measurements in 2019. For 2019, our group originally planned to run engine emissions tests at our home base at SR Technics at Zurich airport, but due to their demanding test cell overhaul, we could […]
