SUBCOMMITTEE ON NAS OPERATIONS 

FINDINGS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

WINTER/SPRING 2016

Findings: UAS Integration in the NAS

Finding 1 

The Subcommittee appreciated the opportunity to learn about the FAA’s UAS plans at 

the recent session of the UAS Research Expo. It is clear that the FAA recognizes the 

need for a high level, cross-agency approach to the integration of UAS in the NAS and 

the Subcommittee strongly concurs and finds that integration of UAS in the NAS will 

require a strong system engineering approach with centralized leadership that is 

capable of making the significant technical and procedural decisions necessary to 

make progress. This system engineering approach must include all aspects of 

integration of UAS in the NAS, including UAS certification and safety, operational 

procedures, and supporting technologies. 

Finding 2 

The Subcommittee finds that FAA has performed significant work to develop a UAS 

concept of operations and a set of mid-term UAS operational scenarios. The FAA has 

decomposed these into a set of FAA requirements and operational shortfalls and an 

evolution strategy for air traffic operations. The FAA has developed a UAS Concept 

Maturation Plan that focuses on those activities that address existing FAA shortfalls 

associated with the provision of air traffic services to UAS airspace users in the midterm and beyond. However, the FAA has not shared this work to any significant 

degree with the external stakeholder community. The result is that the external 

community cannot appreciate the specific problems that the FAA is addressing and is 

unaware of any substantial plan to move toward a solution. In addition, the FAA cannot 

benefit from the ability of the external stakeholder community to recommend innovative 

solutions to some of the problems (e.g., through UAS equipage or procedures). As the 

Subcommittee has already reported to the FAA: “Finding a common approach to 

addressing routine UAS access to the NAS requires that UAS community develop 

patience and understanding of the challenges of operating in the airspace and that the 

FAA develop a greater sense of urgency to allow safe and effective UAS business.” 

Finding 3 

As previously noted by the Subcommittee, the level of effort, as reflected by the 

allocation of RE&D and F&E funding that the FAA has been given in FY’16 for UAS 

research and development, appears to be substantially focused on airframe safety and 

certification and not on the development of operational concepts and procedures that 

are necessary to close the operational and technical shortfalls identified in the UAS 

Concept Maturation Plan. This apparent mismatch will likely further delay the 

integration of UAS in the NAS. 
Finding 4

The Subcommittee finds that the UAS technology space and user demand continues to 

grow at an extremely rapid pace and continues to significantly outstrip the FAA’s ability 

to plan for and conduct the research and development necessary to address the 

operational and technology shortfalls.

Recommendation 1

The Subcommittee recommends that FAA immediately engage the broadest set of 

external stakeholders of the UAS community and share with them the FAA’s UAS 

operational scenarios, requirements breakdown and UAS Concept Maturation Plan. 

The FAA should use this engagement to inform the user community of the technical and 

operational challenges it faces and revise that plan with input from the community.

Recommendation 2

The Subcommittee recommends that FAA establish and maintain high level system 

engineering leadership, as described above, focused on UAS integration in the NAS. 

This leadership should be charged with prioritizing research and development across all 

the FAA organizations to ensure that UAS integration progresses as rapidly as possible. 

This leadership must be able to make the significant operational and technical decisions 

necessary to make this happen. The Subcommittee recommends that this leadership 

develop an integrated research and development plan for UAS in the NAS and present 

a progress report on this plan at its August 2016 meeting.

FAA Response: N/A

Current Status Date: 3/10/2016

Current Status: Open – Pending official FAA response