Life cycle assessment model for eVTOL aircraft in preliminary design: application within the COLOSSUS project

Abstract Electric Vertical Take-Off and Landing (eVTOL) aircraft are emerging as candidates for future Urban and Regional Air Mobility (UAM/RAM). As their development accelerates, assessing environmental performance from the earliest design stages becomes essential. This work presents a simplified and parametric Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) framework tailored to conceptual eVTOL design, enabling rapid environmental evaluations based on subsystem masses and representative material compositions. The model adopts a cradle-to-operation scope and quantifies environmental indicators through mass-driven equations calibrated using industrial inventory data. Application to a representative eVTOL configuration shows that composite structural components dominate production phase impacts, owing to the energy-intensive processing required for carbon fibre reinforced polymers. Lithium-ion battery systems also constitute significant hotspots, particularly in toxicity and resource related categories linked to the extraction and refining of critical materials. Across the full life cycle, operational electricity use emerges as the primary contributor to climate related impacts, while maintenance activities provide a smaller but non-negligible contribution. The findings underline the substantial influence of material choices, component architecture, and electricity sourcing on the overall environmental performance of eVTOL systems. The proposed model offers a compact and transparent tool for integrating sustainability considerations into early design stages and supports the comparative assessment of alternative configurations and technological options for future urban and regional air mobility.