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Recognizing that significant differences exist between certification regulations for eVTOL aircraft in the U.S. and elsewhere, five national aviation authorities including the FAA have released a road map to minimize and eventually remove the differences.
The first version of the Roadmap for Advanced Air Mobility Type Certification has been released by the National Aviation Authorities (NAA) Network, established in 2022 and comprising the FAA, UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), Australia’s Civil Aviation Safety Authority, Transport Canada Civil Aviation and the Civil Aviation Authority of New Zealand. The European Union Aviation Safety Agency is not part of the group.
In the absence of globally harmonized standards for eVTOL type certification, the road map focuses on enabling a streamlined validation process. The goal is to focus the validation by one authority of a type certificate issued by another on the differences in standards and to share information between authorities with the ultimate goal of achieving harmonization.
Within the NAA Network, the biggest difference in certification standards is between the U.S. and UK. The FAA is certifying eVTOLs case-by-case under Part 21.17(b) as a special class of powered-lift aircraft. Australia and Canada are using their equivalents of Part 21.17(b), while New Zealand is flexible.
The UK CAA, however, has adopted the Special Condition for VTOL (SC-VTOL) developed by the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA). The UK also uses EASA’s Special Condition SC E-19 for electric and hybrid propulsion systems, whereas the FAA will certify the engines under the airworthiness criteria for the aircraft.
“The relatively small percentage in differences between these two sets of requirements is where network authorities’ focus will be applied, firstly when validating and secondly when seeking to minimize and harmonize these differences across the NAA Network,” the road map says.
While both certification approaches draw heavily from existing Part 23/CS-23 performance-based regulations for general aviation aircraft, the greatest divide between the U.S. and UK is in the safety assurance level required. For passenger eVTOL operations, SC-VTOL requires the same 10-9 safety level as commercial aircraft while Part 21.17(b) sets a safety level of 10-8 for eVTOLs carrying two-six passengers.
To achieve a streamlined validation effort, the road map requires regulators to accept the type certifying authority’s findings of compliance where there are no differences in standards. The network also promotes the exchange of means of compliance–the testing manufacturers must perform to show they meet the airworthiness criteria.
Release of the road map was welcomed by both Archer and Joby, which plan to certify their eVTOL air taxis with the FAA and then pursue validation with other authorities. “It is a powerful demonstration of mutual trust and unprecedented cooperation, proving that the skies can indeed be truly global,” Greg Bowles, Joby’s head of government policy, said in a blog post.
“If you ever wanted to see a bat signal go up into the air and say advanced air mobility is here, eVTOLs will be built, they will be certified and brought around the world, that’s today,” Archer CEO Adam Goldstein said at the Paris Air Show on June 17, where he joined U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and acting FAA Administrator Chris Rocheleau for the unveiling of the road map.
The road map outlines a three-phased approach to converging on harmonized airworthiness standards and means of compliance. First is to leverage the flexibility inherent in performance-based regulations to harmonize the AAM-specific certification requirements.
Second is to exchange certification knowledge and compliance information so as to converge on requirements where differences exist. Third is to maximize the use of consensus standards and accepted means of compliance to enable streamlined validation.
“Where the NAA Network are not able to reach convergence on an airworthiness requirement, agreement on the application of consensus standards by the Network will help achieve the aim of streamlined validation,” the road map says.
The document promotes the concept of collaborative validation by multi-authority teams to reduce the burden on all the regulators involved. “Ideally this would be implemented through a ‘one-to-many’ collaborative program between the type certifying authority and the validating authorities,” the road map says.
“Whilst multi-authority validation can and will ultimately be underpinned through respective bilateral agreements, a collaborative approach to AAM validation can be taken across the Network now without the need to amend existing or enter into new bilateral or multilateral arrangements,” the document says.
Streamlined validation does not supersede arrangements under existing bilateral agreements between the regulators involved, the road map emphasizes, but it calls for the strategic inclusion of AAM aircraft into updated bilateral agreements between the different authorities.
“One important constraint to recognize across the NAA Network authorities is the time required to establish or update bilateral agreements, which are necessarily bespoke in their nature,” the road map says. “Collaborative multi-authority validation provides a pathway forward whilst individual bilateral agreements are updated.”
A timeline outlined in the road map calls on the Network authorities to converge differences in airworthiness requirements for eVTOL certification by January 2027 and initiate opportunities for multi-authority eVTOL validation by July 2027.
This aligns with plans by Archer and Joby to certify their eVTOLs with the FAA by the end of 2026, but the road map cautions that “timelines cannot yet be fully quantified given the nascent phase of AAM aircraft certification and operations.”
