Re:Airbus pioneers a superconducting powertrain cooled by li...
by Tuna-Fish on Wednesday April 21, 2021 @09:57AM
(#26889756)
If I understand correctly, this makes use of a hydrogen fuel cell for electric power, and then has that turn electric fans.
In general, a modern fuel cell is ~60% efficient at turning chemical energy into electricity, and an electric fan is ~4x as efficient at turning electricity into thrust when compared to a turbofan engine turning chemical energy into thrust.
So ignoring transmissions losses (which would probably be really low anyway if ran on superconductors...) you'd need about 40% of the power of a modern jet to do the same work. There is clearly a lot of scaling work needed, and I don't see a fuel cell/electric aircraft beating existing ones anytime soon if you ignore the emissions, but at least this clearly shows that there is a future for mass commercial aviation once burning carbohydrates is no longer acceptable.
The 0.5 MW system described looks like a good first step, but should be scaled up quickly. Results will be immediately useful for co-generation and energy storage on terrestrial power systems. For at least the next decade, that will be its only benefit, which may come to overshadow its aviation application, particularly if the latter encounters snags.