Review of Past Decade of Aviation Contrail Research: Insights and Future Directions for Operational Mitigation

Airline operators require reliable and accurate contrail prediction for effective operational mitigation. While scientific understanding of aviation-induced contrails has improved over the past decade, significant challenges remain, particularly uncertainties regarding relative humidity and physics modeling. The Ames Contrail Simulation Model (ACSM) was developed over a decade ago, in the early 2010s. The goal of this report is to update scientific findings since that initial development and propose improvements to ACSM.

The lifecycle of contrails involves a series of complex cloud microphysics processes. This report is intended for both atmospheric scientists studying aviation contrails and for readers from other fields, such as air traffic operation researchers and software engineers, who seek to understand the physics behind aviation contrails.