Systematic Identification of Stakeholder Needs for Sustainable Long-Range Aircraft of 2050

Designing long-range aircraft for operation in 2050 represents a complex multidisciplinary challenge that requires integrating technical performance with broader sustainability objectives, including environmental responsibility, economic viability, circular economy principles, and social acceptance. Although previous studies have explored stakeholder needs in aviation, they typically focus on limited stakeholder groups, emphasize technical and operational requirements, or address specific aircraft concepts, resulting in a fragmented and insufficiently systematic understanding of sustainability-driven needs for future long-range aircraft. This study addresses this gap by providing a comprehensive and structured identification of stakeholders that directly or indirectly influence the development of long-range aircraft, together with a systematic derivation and classification of their needs. The analysis is based on an extensive review of academic literature, grey literature, regulatory documents, and industry sources. Stakeholders were organized into coherent categories and subgroups capturing the full ecosystem—including manufacturers, operators, passengers, regulators, communities, and energy suppliers—and a total of 191 stakeholder needs were identified and analyzed across technical, environmental, economic, circular, and social dimensions. The resulting needs establish a holistic and reusable foundation to inform the conceptual design and design parameters of future long-range aircraft within the ongoing European EXAELIA project, which focuses on conceptualizing disruptive long-range aircraft to inform and drive the development of flying testbeds. By integrating multidimensional stakeholder expectations at the earliest design stages, this work supports the development of aircraft that are not only technically robust but also environmentally sustainable, economically viable, circular, and socially inclusive.