Boeing has updated its Cascade climate impact modeling tool to make it easier for users to glean insight from the wealth of information and data visualizations that can be found on the online platform. Cascade, which Boeing launched in May during the company’s Sustainable Aviation Together Forum in Seattle, offers the public a free tool for measuring the impact of various decarbonization strategies—such as the production of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) and the adoption of new electric, hydrogen-powered, and hybrid aircraft—as the global aviation industry strives to reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.
“The intention is to allow the user to build their own future for aviation and for it not to be Boeing saying, ‘This is how it’s going to be,’ because no one knows how we’re going to decarbonize aviation. It’s complex,” Neil Titchener, Boeing’s Cascade program lead, told AIN. “There’s lots of different levers that you can pull on, and so we’re giving some of the power to the user for them to explore how to decarbonize aviation.”
Titchener said the Cascade team has made several improvements to the platform based on feedback from a variety of users, including airlines, financiers, and universities. Many of those users said they felt overwhelmed by all of the information and options that the tool provides, so the team added a new “insights” feature to improve clarity and accessibility.
When navigating Cascade, users can click on the sidebar to find additional context and guided tutorials that will be updated over time. As of today, two “insights” are available on the platform. One unpacks the strategies behind ICAO’s Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (Corsia), and the other explores the relationship between supply and demand for SAF. The latter includes a link to Boeing’s SAF dashboard, another tool the company launched this year to track the projected availability of SAF over the next decade.
“We’re really excited to build out more of these insights because the tool can still feel quite overwhelming for people when they enter it,” Titchener said. For example, he’d like to incorporate information about how different methods of SAF production and more fuel-efficient aircraft might impact life cycle emissions.
In addition to the accessibility improvements, Cascade has also been updated with new data, including charts that project energy requirements for the production of SAF, hydrogen, and electricity, along with the associated emissions. The tool now also includes data from the Commercial Market Outlook Boeing published in June and the World Air Cargo Forecast it published in November 2022, combining those 20-year projections and extending that data through 2050.
“The key to unlocking decarbonization in aviation is definitely collaboration. We need the energy providers, we need the finance, and we need the technical expertise to all come together to drive us to net zero,” Titchener said. “It’s a complex topic, and a lot of people are still very early on in the journey to understanding how we get there, [so] we think the tool is really powerful as an engagement and education piece to help us align and to help us move in the right direction.”
