Assessment of a Performance-based Surveillance Function in the U-space Architecture in Low/Medium Risk U-space Airspaces

This paper introduces an approach to include a surveillance performance monitoring functionality within U-space. First, an introduction to the Performance-Based Surveillance (PBS) paradigm and the tools that make use of it has been made. Then, the U-space service framework and its surveillance functionality were put into context from a regulatory point of view. After this, the source where the surveillance monitoring will take place has been assessed. To validate the approach, a series of simulations of representative U-space scenarios with different densities and traffic mixes was carried out. The surveillance performance monitoring tool has been shown to accurately represent the performance of the surveillance sources in a scenario using different metrics. A discussion on the approach’s limitations and on how it could be applied to support U3-advanced U-space services is presented at the end of the paper.