Rule-based optimization approach for airline load planning system

For a multiple-segment flight with passenger aircraft, the primary objective of commodity load planning is to improve the operational efficiency while satisfying the constraints of weight and balance, aircraft structure limitation and flight safety. Unfortunately the objective is hard to be measured since commodity information of down-line stations is unavailable. In order to solve this problem a rule based optimization approach is proposed in this paper. The approach is a heuristic described by rule flow, which is constructed by high-level business logic and optimization algorithms. Based on such approach, a system with a visual rule editor, a business object modeler and a rule engine was developed and implemented in a North American airline. The flexibility, stability and efficiency of the system were illustrated by real cases studies from the client. And the client's operation results had proved the system can help the client save about $84 Million per year on fuel consumption and improve its ground operation efficiency.