Advanced Air Mobility Challenges: What are the Barriers to Operations?

Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) faces a number of challenges getting to market, including safe integration into airspace, clarifying regulatory framework, and funding, but none are insurmountable. (See August’s APN Global for a summary of AAM.)

Safe integration into airspace

Initial electric Vertical Takeoff and Landing (eVTOL) aircraft operations in AAM, in theory, will fit into traditional U.S. airspace operations. The first eVTOL operations will be in aircraft about the size of a Cirrus SR-22, piloted by FAA-certificated pilots, and in some cases, using traditional heliports.

As the industry grows, and especially as aircraft grow more and more automated until eventually being fully autonomous, airspace procedures must be developed to ensure safe integration with manned aircraft. NASA has proposed the use of “corridors” to segregate AAM traffic – especially automated traffic – but this concept is not fully fleshed out and presents its own challenges.

Regulatory, including operations and airman qualifications, framework

Drones and eVTOL aircraft face uncertainty regarding the regulatory framework, including operations rules and airman qualifications.

To date, the regulatory framework for drones in commercial operations has been determined on a case-by-case basis utilizing the FAA’s exemption process. The current Part 135 operators each hold dozens of exemptions related to operations and airman qualifications.

eVTOL aircraft face a different challenge. These aircraft are not really airplanes but not really rotorcraft. While they take off vertically, some fly more like an airplane and others fly more like helicopters. Most are pursuing innovative technology in their cockpits, making it even more difficult to identify with a particular aircraft category.

The FAA recently told most eVTOL manufacturers their aircraft would be considered powered-lift – not airplanes or helicopters. Aside from airman qualification regulations in Part 61, there are very few regulations for powered-lift operations.

The FAA announced it will publish a Special Federal Aviation Regulation (SFAR), which, according to the Unified Regulatory Agenda, will “resolve discrepancies within the regulations, where powered-lift had been introduced in airmen regulations but not introduced for any of the associated operating regulations. This discrepancy is a barrier to the introduction of these types of aircraft into commercial service within the national airspace system (NAS).”

Funding

AAM operations, particularly eVTOL and electric Short Takeoff and Landing (eSTOL) manufacturers currently still in development phases, also face funding challenges, especially if the U.S. goes into an extended recession. In the late 1990s, it cost in the tens of millions to certificate a small aircraft. A decade later, the Eclipse Jet, certificated in 2006, reportedly broke the billion-dollar barrier for small aircraft. These costs are for reasonably traditional aircraft, with small steps in modernization as technology improved.

Several OEMs are using special-purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) as a funding mechanism. SPACs were introduced in the early 1990s but Virgin Galactic’s SPAC deal in 2019 kicked off the SPAC funding trend in pre-revenue emerging tech in aviation and defense.

SPACs, also called ‘blank check companies” or “reverse mergers”, acquire a target company. In recent years, these target companies have included pre-revenue start-ups. The target company then goes public through the SPAC entity.

Thoughtful resolution of these challenges – and simply the realities of developing, producing, and introducing any new aircraft type – will help ensure measured, safe integration into the airspace and minimal impact on traditional operations while allowing innovative technologies to take flight.