A scenario aggregation-based approach for determining a robust airline fleet composition for dynamic capacity allocation

Recently, airlines and aircraft manufacturers have realized the benefits of the emerging concept of dynamic capacity allocation, and have initiated advanced decision support systems to assist them in this respect. Strategic airline fleet planning is one of the major issues addressed through such systems. We present background research connected with the dynamic allocation concept, which accounts explicitly for the stochastic nature of passenger demand in the fleet composition problem. We address this problem through a scenario aggregation-based approach and present results on representative case studies based on realistic data. Our investigations establish clear benefits of a stochastic approach as compared with deterministic formulations, as well as its implementation feasibility using state-of-the-art optimization software.