Five Years of OLGA: What We Learned What Comes Next

As the OLGA Project (hOListic & Green Airports) reaches its formal conclusion, the European aviation sector stands at a pivotal turning point. Launched in 2021 under the European Green Deal, OLGA brought together 58 partners, ranging from major hubs and regional airports to airlines, research institutes, public authorities, and innovative SMEs. Over five years of collaboration, field testing, and technological deployment, the project addressed one of the most critical challenges of our decade: turning sustainable aviation concepts into tangible, scalable, real-world realities.

For ENV-ISA, serving as a core consortium member has been a natural extension of our core mission. Having led Work Package 6 (Cross-cutting Aspects), ENV-ISA developed integrated monitoring and modeling approaches for real-time emissions and air quality assessment, and refined the industry’s understanding of airport-related emission sources, particularly at a time when Scope 3 regulations are becoming a central point of focus across the sector.

As the final results are presented and key learnings are shared across the sector, we reflect on why participating in OLGA mattered for ENV-ISA, how our science-based and experience-fed holistic approach shaped our role, and what this milestone means for the future of environmental intelligence in aviation.

1. The OLGA Legacy: A Truly Holistic Approach to Airport Sustainability

Sustainably transforming an airport ecosystem cannot be achieved through isolated fixes. An airport is not merely a runway or a terminal, it is a complex, high-density organism where airside operations, ground transport, energy infrastructure, local biodiversity, and surrounding communities continuously interact.

The core strength of the OLGA Project lay in its hOListic vision of the airport as a single ecosystem.By evaluating everything from Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAF) integration and low-carbon ground mobility to air quality management and community impact, OLGA demonstrated that true decarbonization requires an end-to-end perspective.

For ENV-ISA, this holistic perspective is at the very heart of our operations:

  • Interconnected systems. Air quality and emissions cannot be assessed in a vacuum. Ground support equipment (GSE), aircraft taxiing, auxiliary power units (APUs), and surrounding road transport all contribute to local air quality and overall greenhouse gas profiles.

  • Evidence-based decision making. Meaningful operational changes require high-precision, real-time data. Through Work Package 6, ENV-ISA provided the analytical backbone to measure, quantify, and model these impacts with scientific accuracy.

  • Scalability across airport profiles. Innovations tested at major hubs like Paris-Charles de Gaulle were adapted and demonstrated at regional airports such as Zagreb and Cluj, confirming that environmental solutions can work as replicable blueprints across airports of different sizes.

2. ENV-ISA’s Contribution: Driving Real-Time Environmental Intelligence (WP6)

Within a large-scale European consortium, actionable data is the key enabler for long-term change. ENV-ISA’s leadership in Work Package 6 focused on turning raw environmental data into operational insight, centered on two pillars:

  1. Integrated monitoring and modeling. We built real-time emissions and air quality assessment tools tailored to complex airport environments, combining sensor data with predictive modeling to observe environmental fluctuations as they happen rather than relying on delayed estimates.
  2. Disaggregating airport emission sources. Understanding the precise contribution of individual airport-related activities, from idling aircraft to ground logistics, is what allows mitigation strategies to be targeted where they matter most. Improving local air quality starts with knowing exactly where emissions originate and how they disperse into surrounding communities.

By producing robust, transparent, and standardized environmental metrics, ENV-ISA’s work in WP6 forms part of the evidence base that green operational policies, cleaner fleet transitions, and regulatory compliance can build on.

3. Beyond Demonstration: From Pilot Projects to Scalable Deployment

At the OLGA Final Event, partners and industry experts reviewed five years of results through three perspectives: Passengers, Airlines & Airport Operations, and Local Communities.

Reaching the final chapter of a Horizon 2020 project is a milestone, but the real value of OLGA lies in what happens next. Demonstration projects prove that solutions are technically viable; the next step is deployment, scaling, and commercial adaptation.

What remains from OLGA are the frameworks, datasets, and methodologies developed along the way. The monitoring protocols and air quality models built during the project are already being carried forward into the next phase of smart aviation management across Europe.

4. What’s Next: Turning Expertise into the Next Chapter with AURACLE

The completion of OLGA marks the end of one journey and the start of another. The expertise, field data, and collaborative insight built over five years give ENV-ISA a strong foundation for what comes next.

We are already translating this technical domain knowledge into our next endeavor: AURACLE.

AURACLE is the next evolution in environmental intelligence for aviation. Built on our work in OLGA, it extends integrated monitoring, predictive modeling, and real-time environmental management, so airports, authorities, and aviation partners can stay ahead of regulatory demands while working toward measurable sustainability outcomes.

Conclusion: A Shared Vision for Sustainable European Skies

Being a core member of the OLGA Project consortium reflects ENV-ISA’s positioning as a partner in aviation sustainability. Working alongside leading airports, industrial partners, and research institutions reinforced our conviction that sustainable transformation requires precise data, holistic thinking, and sustained collaboration.

As we close the OLGA chapter, we thank all consortium partners for five years of shared work and results. The path to net-zero aviation is a long one, and ENV-ISA remains committed to it.

Explore the official results and outcomes of the OLGA Project here: OLGA Project Results

 

Work with us

The monitoring and modeling approaches developed in OLGA are now part of our Local Air Quality Management work with airports.

If you are assessing emissions or air quality at your airport, book a meeting with our team.

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