This project has received funding from the SESAR Joint Undertaking under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 101017682.

CORUS XUAM
Concept of operations for european u-space services - extension for urban air mobility
The CORUS-XUAM project proposes to demonstrate U-space solutions to support Urban Air Mobility (UAM) flight operations and develop the necessary operational procedures and requirements, considering safety, efficiency and social acceptability. The consortium is an extension of the CORUS Consortium, who delivered the SJU U-space Concept of Operations in September 2019, with the addition of UAM competencies.
The project will involve extensive consultation with the U-space stakeholders. The project will update the U-space ConOps, addressing the integration of drones into airspaces currently used by manned aircraft (Very Low Level and above), refining definitions of services and identifying new U3/U4 services. The theoretical part of the project will constitute a small part of the overall effort of the project, the majority being six demonstrations in different countries. Overlaid on these demonstrations, a validation activity will examine the effectiveness of the proposed U-space procedures and services, the main results being fed back into the revised ConOps by the end of the project.
The demonstrations will involve flights by passenger-carrying vehicles, as well as large and small UAS, some with vertical take-off, some conventional, all of them being electric. They will occur in urban, suburban and rural areas, in controlled (airports, harbours) and uncontrolled airspaces. They will involve different missions such as passenger transport, logistics, delivery, emergency response and surveillance. The demonstrations will use different U-space deployment architectures and explore technology’s state of the art. They will consider coordination and transfer between ATC and U-space, including interaction with human ATCOs and pilots. The demonstrations will combine flights by test vehicles with other traffic, and (virtually) transpose flight into the CTRs of major airports. Vertiport processes and procedures, separation, and data services will also be demonstrated.
The project intends to develop CONOPS, procedures and solutions to develop UAM and make ATM and UTM integrated. Activities are dedicated to design how UAM services are provided operating safely UAS with a specific focus on how UAS are integrated into the air space. UTM systems functionalities are developed with a particular attention on how data are collected from UAS and on how data flow between UTM and ATM.
The CONOPS were tested in several test case scenarios. DTA has participated at the Italian cluster demonstrating the capacity to operate a logistic urgent operation starting from an airport (airport of Grottaglie-Taranto, Italy) and reaching an urban aerodrome through GA-like cargo aircraft then the package is loaded on a small drone for last mile delivery near the hospital of Manduria.
The test was successfully realized in June 2022.
The development of CONOPS and of UTM solutions is enabling UAM services. Technology and regulation prevent UAS operators to provide standardized UAM. Innovative platforms, including modules to manage the interaction between the platform and the UTM system, are under development by many manufacturers in Europe. Similarly the U-space services are in their infancy: the theoretical concepts are quite well designed, but the UAM community lacks solid experiences and confidence on the systems and operations and contingencies are not clearly assessed.
The CORUS-XUAM results provide benefits in term of integration of ATM and UTM, enabled the air space service provider to study and test how to interact with UAM stakeholders, namely which data and information are relevant and how to communicate them.
The solutions and the test have enabled the community to realize concrete experiences on how to manage UAM into city and into controlled air traffic zones.
Project manager: Giancarlo Ferrara, EUROCONTROL
Budget: 6625500,25 EUR
Project start: 1 January 2021
Lifetime: 24 months
For more informations: Antonio Zilli, antonio.zilli@dtascarl.it
Lead partner: EUROCONTROL
Partner: AEROPORTS DE PARIS, ASLOGIC 2011, THE BRITISH LIGHT AVIATION CENTRE LIMITED, DFS DEUTSCHE FLUGSICHERUNG GMBH, DEUTSCHES ZENTRUM FUER LUFT – UND RAUMFAHRT EV, Droniq GmbH, DIRECTION DES SERVICES DE LA NAVIGATION AERIENNE, ENAIRE, ENAV, FUNDACIÓ HEMAV, INDRA SISTEMAS, LUFTFARTSVERKET, NATS (EN ROUTE), PIPISTREL VERTICAL SOLUTIONS DOO PODJETJE ZA NAPREDNE LETALSKE RESITVE, SkeyDrone Belgium, UNIFLY BE, UNIVERSITAT POLITECNICA DE CATALUNYA, Volocopter GmbH