Page 17 - AAA NOVEMBER - DECEMBER 2013 Online Magazine

FEATURE COMPONENT REFURBISH

assessed with parts listed and equipment According to the EU/Airbus/PAMELA The critical issues in aircraft component
identified as being salvageable or not. blurb, “ … this proves the world’s first full- counterfeiting indicate that, above all,
During the disassembly stage, the PAMELA scale [recycling] project and has identified any solution demands what Parry calls
system removes any reusable parts from a generic methodology for handling all “joined-up business intelligence across
the aircraft, such as instruments, the end-of-life aircraft, along with a set of best a range of related disciplines” including
engines and landing gear. These are then practices.” Which again is all very nice individual screening) critical structural
checked and certified so they can be used if everybody goes along with those best analysis and continuous, and end-to-end
as spare parts for other aircraft. practices. But pretty obviously they don’t. assurance and certification of the process
As a result of the first PAMELA trial, It’s too expensive, and too hard to fathom from factory to fuselage.
Airbus and waste specialist SITA France out who made what, where and when, and The banks seem to manage exactly that
set up a company in 2009 called TARMAC catalogue the history. Plus it reduces the across hundreds of countries, trillions of
Aerosave, dedicated to dismantling end- profit margin. dollars a day, and in real time with highly
of-life aircraft in an environmentally- complex trading products. What makes it
friendly way. TARMAC can dismantle up to Tangled processes so hard to do within the aircraft industry?
30 large aircraft a year, and aims to recycle As Parry notes in his report, the aircraft Could it be entrenched fiefdoms jealously
or re-use up to 85% of the parts and business features an “interlocking, guarding their patch and not bothering
materials from each aircraft. “This takes tangled and often opaque trading system,” too much if a problem lands on somebody
considerably longer than non-selective which makes warning signs marking out else’s mat? Sadly, it looks like that is the
dismantling, but our aim is to recycle potential fakes or dangerous parts difficult case.
materials for higher value purposes,” to spot - especially when manufacturing,
explains Malavallon. trading and maintenance chains overlap.

RECyCLED CARBON FIBER?!
Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner uses a high proportion of carbon fibre. On the face of it, it
would seem un-recyclable. But Boeing has been working on recycling composites,
and research has shown not only that carbon fibre can be recovered, but that it can
be re-used. “Surface characteristics, bond-ability with new resin, and overall quality
are comparable to that of new fiber and suitable for use in high-end industrial
manufacturing,” says a Boeing release. The company has already started testing
recycled CFRP in nonstructural aircraft components, with a potential for significant
savings of money and carbon dioxide. A 70% cost and 95% electricity saving is likely. If
the 1million kg of carbon fibre scrap that commercial jet manufacturing is estimated
to produce in 2014 is recovered and recycled it will save enough electricity to power
175,000 typical homes a year.

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