Contrails Detection Dashboard

Interaction design • Prototyping

For project Contrails I played a key role in a collaborative project to enhance the usability of a dashboard crucial for scientists working to combat climate change. By optimizing the interface, I aimed to empower researchers to effectively detect contrail formations, potentially mitigating over 100 Mton of carbon dioxide emissions by 2030.

2 months

User Need

Scientists need an improved dashboard so they can better detect contrails and provide recommendations to mitigate c02 from the atmosphere.

My Design Process

Original dashboard

  • Not inline with current Google branding.

  • Timeline and utility bar take up too much map real estate.

  • Current layers position doesn’t allow for new layers and scaling.

My solution

  • Implemented the GM3 design system to make the dashboard more modern and reflect the Google brand.

  • Consolidated the timeline and utility bar to allow for more map real estate.

  • Repositioned layers panel to allow for new layers and scaling.

Creating the components

As this was a quick engagement with the Contrails team I decided to implement the Google Material 3 design system. I chose to base my designs around this system, because it would be easiest for engineers to implement without needing a ton of resources.

Date Picker - Full drop down menu

I chose the GM3 full calendar drop down option, because it’s quick, intuitive and allows the user to see the full calendar month with affordances to skip through time. 

Action buttons

To solve the problem of only being able to skip through time manually I added action buttons to play, pause, rewind and forward to allow users to quickly move through time. Play/pause allows the user to watch as the map moves through time automatically. Fast forward and backward allows the user to skip through time 2hrs at a time. 

Timeline scrubber

I didn’t want to remove the option to manually scroll through time, because it still served a purpose in their workflow. Instead I updated the experience to include blue markers for more granular inspection. I also included a day change signifier to let the user know when they are crossing over into a new day, because detection accuracy is incredibly important.

Layer Panels

Sticky Panel - For internal scientists I created the sticky panel specifically for internal scientists who require uninterrupted access to many technical layers. The search bar at the top of the panel allows scientists to quickly find layers. The panel only closes when a user clicks the close button. Otherwise, they can click anywhere outside the panel and it will remain open.

Contrail Attribution - a Design provocation for the future

As mentioned before the Contrails team were developing technologies to better detect and attribute contrails and, because of this the team wanted to see design provocations for how that might be represented in the interface. 

For attribution our users needed to:

  • input a flight and see the flight number, date, and contrail probability attribution

Documentation and handoff for testing and implementation

Throughout the process I consulted with and presented my work through internal work sessions with my team and at meetings with PM, stakeholders and eng. Once all designs were approved and signed off I created two documents for the engineering team. One was a slide deck with gifs of the designs to showcase interactions and further describe what was happening. I also used an internal tool called Markup to do redlining to assist engineering.

Success so far

Project Contrails eventually landed a dedicated team of designers and researchers who were able to develop the product further and my design recommendations were implemented in the final product. Project Contrails launched publicly and partnered with American Airlines were they tested 70 flights over 6 months. During these tests the team found that the predictions reduced contrails by 54% compared to when pilots didn’t use predictions.

Together the Contrails team and American Airlines achieved the industry’s first proof point that commercial airlines can verifiably avoid contrails and thereby reduce their climate impact. Check out the official blog post here!

GIF from live product!