TRANSPORTATION
THE GREAT ELECTRIC air race is underway . European aviation heavyweight Airbus is collaborating with Rolls-Royce and Siemens , while budget airline easyJet has teamed up with California ’ s Wright Electric , with both partnerships targeting the introduction of electric energy storage .
Analysts agree the probability of purely electric shorthaul airliners in the next decade is realistic , but these will be relatively small aircraft carrying 15-20 passengers . Energy storage capacity will be too low to fly a full journey on a 100 % electric flight , so we won ’ t see 100-passenger aircraft flying from London to Amsterdam in 10 years ’ time . The airlines involved in this endeavour are starting to ask whether their future fleet will still consist of large 100-plus seat aircraft , or if they ’ ll have a fleet of smaller aircraft flying shorter routes on full electric .
“ We could see a proliferation of smaller aircraft flying out of the less congested airports on relatively short one-hour routes ,” suggest Mark Cousin , SVP Flight Demonstrators CTO at Airbus . “ This would change the dynamics of air transport and pave the way for autonomous aircraft with no pilot on board , resulting in aviation costs falling dramatically , while maintenance for an electric aircraft will be much cheaper than for one powered by gas turbines .”
Cousin is at the forefront of the Airbus Demonstrators initiative . The programme ’ s goal is to set an objective not achievable with today ’ s technologies to force the development of innovations – in this case , the future of hybrid electric propulsion . “ In the next couple of years , we ’ ll see three major demonstrators ,” reveals Cousin . “ The first is being developed by our colleagues in Silicon Valley – Vahana is a tilt wing single person urban air mobility vehicle . By the end of 2018 we expect the first flight of the City Airbus , a proof of concept of a fourseater air taxi . And we ’ re also due to announce the successor to our E-Fan , the E-Fan X . The only way we can learn what the issues will be , and how we can overcome them to improve our product , is by flying and testing .”
Cousin identifies four key challenges Airbus has chosen to focus on …
Energy Storage Density “ Improvement in the power-to-weight ratio , or energy storage density , of batteries is required . Even when we
42 March 2018