Plans for ‘cleaner’ passenger planes powered by liquid HYDROGEN are drawn up by experts as part of a new project to cut aircraft emissions
- The £3.5 million project is drawing together top academics and industry leaders
- They will tackle some of the biggest challenges facing hydrogen-powered flight
- Air travel currently contributes to 2 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions
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Experts are drawing up plans for hydrogen-powered passenger planes in an attempt to clean up aircraft emissions.
Rather than conventional fuel, the V-shaped vehicles would be powered by cleaner liquid hydrogen, and would give off zero emissions of carbon dioxide.
Air travel currently contributes to 2 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions, a figure that is expected to double in the next two decades.
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Air travel currently contributes to 2 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions, a figure that is expected to rise in the coming decades (stock image)
The £3.5 million ($4.5 million) project, led by Cranfield University in Bedfordshire, is drawing together top academics and industry leaders.
They will tackle some of the biggest challenges facing hydrogen-powered flight, such as on-board storage, the high cost of producing the fuel and safety concerns.
Dr Bobby Sethi, from the university’s propulsion engineering centre, told the Times: ‘There are challenges in using liquid hydrogen but we are hopeful of addressing them within the scope of the project.
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‘We want to show that hydrogen can be not only beneficial environmentally but can be employed safely and affordably in the medium to long term.’
The group will analyse the case for the development of a V-shaped blended wing body aircraft for long-haul flights.
The vehicle will require extra space for the storage of fuel, which must be kept at at minus 250C (minus 418F).
Experts are drawing up plans for hydrogen-powered passenger planes in an attempt to clean up aircraft emissions (stock image)
The technological challenges facing the team are so great that they admit a working demonstration is unlikely until the early 2030s.
Passenger flights are not expected until at least 20 years after that.
Hydrogen produces three times the thrust of kerosene fuel, and gives off zero emissions of carbon dioxide and ultra-low emissions of nitrogen oxide.
Using hydrogen fuel could help cut aircraft greenhouse gas emissions, which are expected to rise with the number of passenger plane flights over the next 20 years.
HOW DO HYDROGEN FUEL CELLS WORK?
Hydrogen fuel cells create electricity to power a battery and motor by mixing hydrogen and oxygen in specially treated plates, which are combined to form the fuel cell stack.
Fuel cell stacks and batteries have allowed engineers to significantly shrink these components to even fit neatly inside a family car, although they are also commonly used to fuel buses and other larger vehicles.
Oxygen is collected from the air through intakes, usually in the grille, and hydrogen is stored in aluminium-lined fuel tanks, which automatically seal in an accident to prevent leaks.
These ingredients are fused, releasing usable electricity and water as byproducts and making the technology one of the quietest and most environmentally friendly available.
Reducing the amount of platinum used in the stack has made fuel cells less expensive, but the use of the rare metal has restricted the spread of their use.
Recent research has suggested hydrogen fuel cell cars could one day challenge electric cars in the race for pollution-free roads, however – but only if more stations are built to fuel them.
Fuel cell cars can be refueled as quickly as gasoline-powered cars and can also travel further between fill-ups.
Fuelling stations cost up to £1.5 million ($2 million) to build, so companies have been reluctant to build them unless more fuel cell cars are on the road.
The U.S. Department of Energy lists just 34 public hydrogen fuelling stations in the country; all but three are in California.
According to Information Trends, there were 6,475 FCV’s worldwide at the end of 2017.
More than half were registered in California, which puts the U.S. (53 per cent) at the forefront for FCV adoption.
Japan takes second place with 38 per cent, while Europe is at nine per cent.
The global number of passenger plane flights is expected to double to 8.2 billion by 2037, according to the International Air Transport Association.
Some companies, including Easyjet, are banking on passenger aircraft powered by enormous batteries to cut their emissions.
But experts behind the new European Commission-funded project, dubbed Enable H2, insisted that electrical long-haul flight was unfeasible.
Dr Sethi said: ‘Existing electric aircraft cannot store enough energy on the batteries to enable you to fly anything more than two passengers and if you look at electrical motors they are huge and very heavy.’
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