EU Fuel Schemes: Basic, Variations and Individual

The fuel/energy scheme is the framework within which a European commercial operator decides how much fuel each flight carries and how that fuel is managed once the flight is under way. It replaced the fuel policy inherited from EU-OPS on 30 October 2022, when Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2021/1296 rewrote the fuel rules of the Air Operations Regulation. The names of the fuel components survived, and so did most basic figures. What changed is the structure around them.

The scheme can be applied at three levels: a basic fuel scheme with fixed figures close to the traditional ones, a basic fuel scheme with variations for operators approved to use specific reductions, and an individual fuel scheme for operators able to derive their own figures from data. This article describes that structure for airplanes in commercial air transport. The fuel components themselves are covered in fuel planning and fuel reserves, and private flights in fuel and energy planning for general aviation.

The 2022 fuel/energy rules

Regulation (EU) 2021/1296 amended the Air Operations Regulation, (EU) No 965/2012, with effect from 30 October 2022. For commercial air transport by airplane, CAT.OP.MPA.180 requires the operator to establish a fuel/energy scheme made up of three policies. The word energy anticipates electric and hybrid aircraft, whose energy has to be planned in the same way as fuel.

The final reserve is written into CAT.OP.MPA.181 itself, but many other figures, such as the contingency percentages and the planning minima for alternates, sit in the acceptable means of compliance (AMC) and guidance material of ED Decision 2022/005/R. The old fuel policy rule, CAT.OP.MPA.150, is now blank. The selection of alternates, formerly EU-OPS 1.295 and 1.297, became part of the scheme as CAT.OP.MPA.182; older texts cite CAT.OP.MPA.185 for planning minima, a number that now covers in-flight fuel management. The rules for non-commercial operations (Part-NCC and Part-NCO) and specialized operations (Part-SPO) were restructured on the same date; in Part-NCO the reserve figures moved out of NCO.OP.125 into its AMC.

Planning and in-flight re-planning policy

The planning policy of CAT.OP.MPA.181 fixes what the pre-flight calculation of usable fuel contains. Taxi fuel is the fuel expected to be used before takeoff. Trip fuel takes the airplane from takeoff to landing at the destination along the most likely routing, with realistic fuel flows, masses and weather. Reserve fuel groups contingency, destination alternate, final reserve and, where required, additional fuel. Above the minimum come extra fuel, planned for anticipated delays or specific operational constraints, and discretionary fuel, added at the commander's discretion. EU-OPS had a single extra fuel for both.

Contingency fuel absorbs deviations from the plan: stronger winds, a different routing or level, or an airframe that burns more than the book figure. It is calculated on trip fuel only, never on alternate fuel. Final reserve fuel is fuel to fly for 30 minutes for turbine-engined airplanes, or 45 minutes for piston-engined airplanes, at holding speed at 1,500 ft (450 m) above aerodrome elevation in standard conditions, calculated at the estimated mass on arrival at the destination alternate, or at the destination when no alternate is required.

In-flight re-planning applies the same build-up from a point en route; contingency is then taken on the trip fuel remaining from that point. The other two policies complete the scheme. The aerodrome selection policy (CAT.OP.MPA.182) decides which alternates a flight needs and the weather they must be forecast to have (see alternate aerodromes). The in-flight fuel management policy (CAT.OP.MPA.185) requires fuel checks at regular intervals and sets when crews declare MINIMUM FUEL and MAYDAY FUEL (see in-flight fuel management).

The basic fuel scheme

The basic fuel scheme uses fixed figures that stay close to those of EU-OPS:

• Contingency fuel is the higher of 5 percent of the planned trip fuel and the fuel to fly for 5 minutes at holding speed at 1,500 ft above the destination in standard conditions.
• Additional fuel, where the other components do not already cover it, allows for an engine failure or loss of pressurization at the most critical point of the route: the airplane descends as necessary, flies to an adequate alternate, holds there for 15 minutes at 1,500 ft above aerodrome elevation and makes an approach and landing.
• Alternates must be forecast at or above planning minima that add fixed increments to the minima of the approach available there (AMC6 CAT.OP.MPA.182), shown in the table below.

On short sectors the 5-minute floor often decides. A light twin with a planned trip fuel of 40 kg and a holding fuel flow of 60 kg/h needs 5 kg of contingency fuel, not the 2 kg that 5 percent would give.

Variations: reduced contingency and destination alternate options

The basic fuel scheme with variations keeps the structure of the basic scheme but replaces some fixed figures with reductions that the competent authority has approved for the operator. Typical examples are:

• Reduced contingency with a fuel ERA. Contingency may be cut from 5 to 3 percent of trip fuel when a suitable en-route alternate, the fuel ERA, is available.
• Statistical contingency. An operator with a fuel consumption monitoring program may, with approval, base contingency on a statistical analysis of its actual consumption, below 5 percent.
• Decision point procedure. The flight is planned via a decision point from which it can still reach an en-route alternate, and contingency for the destination is calculated only from that point onward. At the decision point the crew compare the fuel on board with what the onward leg needs, then continue or divert. The saving, at most the contingency for the leg from departure to the decision point, can be turned into payload. An operator may use the procedure only where its approved scheme includes it.
• Planning minima with more credit. Alternates are assessed against a finer table (AMC8 CAT.OP.MPA.182) that rewards better approaches.

An alternate served only by one non-precision approach with an MDH of 350 ft and a minimum visibility of 1,500 m must be forecast to have at least 750 ft and 3,000 m under the basic scheme. With variations, if a second type A approach on a separate navigation aid were also usable, the table would give 550 ft and 2,500 m.

Individual fuel schemes and safety performance monitoring

An individual fuel scheme goes furthest. Instead of taking the AMC figures, with or without approved variations, the operator derives its own fuel quantities from data on its routes and fleet, and the scheme needs the competent authority's approval. It is meant for operators with a mature management system, because the figures are only as good as the data behind them and the organization's ability to notice when they stop being adequate.

One source of that data is a fuel consumption monitoring program, which records the actual burn of each aircraft against the planning figures over many flights. Analyzed statistically, such data show how much contingency fuel is really used on a route. They also reveal individual airframes whose performance has deteriorated and which burn more than the fleet figures assume.

The data then feed the management system that ORO.GEN.200 requires of the operator. In safety management terms, a new or reduced fuel figure is a change, whose hazards are identified and risks assessed before it is introduced. Once it is in use, safety performance monitoring tracks indicators against targets using operational data. For fuel, possible indicators are how often flights land with less fuel than planned, how often crews declare MINIMUM FUEL and how often a diversion is forced by fuel (see safety management systems).

Fuel ERA aerodromes

A fuel ERA aerodrome, or fuel en-route alternate, is an en-route alternate selected so that contingency fuel can be reduced to 3 percent of trip fuel. Under EU-OPS it was called the 3% ERA. Late in the flight it offers somewhere to land if consumption has run above plan, which is why less contingency need be carried all the way to the destination. It must lie within a defined area along the later part of the route, and its weather must be forecast at or above the same planning minima that apply to a destination alternate.

A fuel ERA is not the same as the other en-route alternates in the rules. A performance class A twin without an extended range approval must stay within 60 or 120 minutes' one-engine-inoperative flight of an adequate aerodrome, depending on its seats and mass (CAT.OP.MPA.140). ETOPS flights name en-route alternates within their approved diversion time, planned with increments of 200 ft and 800 m for a precision approach and 400 ft and 1,500 m for a non-precision or circling approach (see ETOPS). Those alternates protect against a failure; the fuel ERA protects the fuel calculation.

Isolated aerodromes

An isolated aerodrome is a destination for which no destination alternate is available within a reasonable diversion. Under Part-CAT an airplane may use one as a destination only with the competent authority's prior approval (CAT.OP.MPA.106). The flight carries no alternate fuel; additional fuel takes its place, and the destination itself must be forecast at or above the planning minima normally applied to alternates.

Many exam questions quote the EU-OPS figures. Under EU-OPS a turbine airplane's destination counted as isolated when the fuel to divert to the nearest adequate alternate plus final reserve exceeded 2 hours at normal cruise consumption above the destination, and the planning figure mirrored that test: enough additional fuel for additional plus final reserve fuel to last 2 hours at normal cruise consumption above the destination. For piston airplanes EU-OPS used 45 minutes plus 15 percent of the planned cruise time, or 2 hours, whichever was less.

Such flights are planned around a point of safe return, the last point from which the airplane can return to its departure aerodrome, or reach an en-route alternate, with the required reserves; EU-OPS built its procedure around a similar predetermined point. Before passing it, the crew confirm the destination weather and the fuel remaining, because beyond it they are committed (see point of equal time and point of no return). Part-NCO, by contrast, has had no isolated aerodrome provision since 30 October 2022.

What changed from EU-OPS

Many exam questions still carry EU-OPS wording. The main differences are:

When a question names EU-OPS or the rules before October 2022, answer with the old figures; when it names Part-CAT, a current rule or nothing at all, use the current ones (see from EU-OPS to Part-CAT).

FAA rules for airlines state their reserves in Part 121 itself. A domestic flight needs fuel to the destination, then to the most distant alternate, then for 45 minutes at normal cruising fuel consumption (14 CFR 121.639). A turbojet on flag or supplemental operations outside the 48 contiguous states adds fuel for 10 percent of the flight time to the destination, then to the most distant alternate, then for 30 minutes of holding at 1,500 ft above the alternate (121.645).

Library articles are written for study and exam preparation. They do not replace your aircraft's approved documentation, your operator's procedures or the regulations themselves.