I think this is a great idea. Keep going. I'm all for turbo-electric aircraft. There are lots of haters in the comments here but I stand with this guy.
Superconductivity is now at 233K (-40C) which is about the temperature at 30,000 ft. So the superconducting material needs to be super cooled on the way up and the way down. Personally I think assisted takeoff will provide more fuel savings than hybrid power trains. Current engines are large enough to get lift, but an awful lot of mass to carry for 10000 miles. Assisted take off allows making the engines smaller, and hence much more efficient for the remainder of the journey.
@@justinjay6930 Depends on the battery. Solid state batteries will work fine. For the current generation of batteries, you keep them encased, and they will produce plenty of heat as the motor draws down on them. The batteries will be much more efficient at lower temperatures.
@Capt777harris You would only need cooling liquid on the way up. You could always compress the air at altitude for the descent. The problem of takeoff remains though. Turbofans are extremely efficient at high altitude. You can move the plane on one small engine, but you have to carry two very large engines for the whole trip, just because you needed those engines to take off.
I don't think you can expect to rely on superconductive effects on aircraft, at least not with current physics we know. It's not enough to establish a superconductivity record in the lab, under optimal conditions. As you increase the magnetic field strength and the current density, you need colder temperatures to maintain the superconducting state. (I didn't know superconductivity had been achieved at such an absolutely torrid temperature! If so, that's really exciting. Seriously. I'm going to check it out, so thanks for the tip!)
Well, I checked it out, and I haven't found any mention of any temperature over minus 70 C. And of course, that's just a lab experiment. Where did you find a claim of minus 40?
With all the developments in electric VTOLs, I was looking for information about what the airline industry was doing to combat fuel use & begin to convert to some form of hybrid electric solution. Amazingly, I didn't have to look far! This is an exciting, workable idea, that I sincerely hope *_will_* be implemented as soon as possible. Thanks for an inspiring talk! 𝒕𝒂𝒗𝒊.
Inorder to make aircrafts fully electric we need battery energy density of more than 20 kwh/kg so can safely land. Which is not possible to get from current batteries. The Faster way to go green with aviation is to adopt carbon neutral fuels like biofuels and synthetic fuels produced by CO² capture from the atmosphere using renewable energy sources. The Future is in recycling "CO²".
@1:30 "We have signed up to keeping total aviation emissions at the current level." Not good enough. The IPCC says global carbon emissions need to be net zero by 2050. Better to invest the research dollars in sustainable aviation fuel.
Aviation is increasing, but it's still a small portion of the total, and has spent every year since the 70s working on efficiency, and is continuing. How about before you focus on them too much, we look at the 90% of the economy that's been dragging its rear on the topic. You get more reduction that way.
One thing is to reduce the need for air-transportation of consumer packages. Items produced overseas or hundreds of miles away can be cached locally at warehouses after slower shipping by boats or ground transport allowing for instant and quick ground-transit from local warehouses instead of requiring air transport from overseas or other regions. It just requires more careful advanced planning and more wide-spread distribution of products to meet the "buy it now" demands of consumers using much more efficient and less enviro-costly ground transit instead of air transit. People also could use train transit as oppose to air transit for regional hops. Few things require the speed of air transport for intra-state distances. Most things that require transporting items with urgency are great examples of complete failure to plan for the near term and long term maintenances and needs for such things, to have critical items on hand for when critical items fail so overnight shipping doesn't become a "need". The best way to decreased air emissions (for package and material transport) is to use less air sevices as a substitute for proper medium and long term planning and good maintenance practices. People are lazy, and they want everything yesterday, so just never mind what I just said. lol
CO2 from commercial aviation is a very low percentage of human generated C02 from non-renewable sources. Hybrid Electric planes will only be popular if they provide airlines with lower operational costs (ie the fuel savings must dramatically exceed the added cost) .. ironically, Money is the path to Green
@@djp3637 Agreed, fuel cost is a huge factor .. and so is Weight, as this video points out, if they can get the weight down, a hybrid system could provide lower operational costs overall .. only then we will see it in use... which is what I originally stated.
@@bob15479 Depends on the cost of capital. The important point of this video is that reducing engine size on aircraft is a virtuous circle. Less mass means less fuel, which in turn means less mass. If we could fire energy at the aircraft from the ground, air travel would be very cheap indeed.
Complete believer that a gas turbine can be used to generate power that can be then used to run electric ducted fans. Have to see if one day batteries get light enough but the GT as a power supplier should work nicely!
Yes but in a couple of hours you can make as much more miles than a Prius or any other car will do in a year. Thats the problem. Also Kerosene releases more co2 molécules by its chemical composition.
Lox / LH would not only provide fuel but also cool down the superconductive elements into their workable ranges. Similarly, housing the magnets into the engine venting, thereby turning the fans from the outside rather than the center might yield some interesting efficiencies in itself.
Hydrogen is not a fuel. It is an energy carrier and a lousy one at that. Airlines around the world use about 100 billion gallons of fuel. The US an brazil together produce enough biofuels to cover at least a quarter of that today.
all sorts of possibilities if you're using hydrolox, for example you could spec the motors for cruise power, and use lightweight rocket thrusters or turbopumps for adding extra power for take off or you could skip having turbines, and use fuel cells to provide electrical power, again using the cryogenic LH2/LOX to cut down on the weight that would normally be required for watercooling the fuel cell stack and perhaps most interestingly of all, you wouldn't have your engine performance limited by altitude, so the plane could fly higher up to reduce drag (possibly again using LH2/LOX to cool the skin of the aircraft to avoid heating problems?) of course the LOX is going to be adding a lot of weight vs. using atmospheric oxygen, so not sure if it's really worth it unless you're aiming for super high speeds, eg. a suborbital rocket, or hypersonic spaceplane
Without a mechanically reliable high temperature superconductor, and we don't have those, or a large cooling mechanism on the plane, this is not a ready solution. Better models of conventional motors are hitting greater performance thresholds and might make this viable for routes up to 1000-2000km in the near future. The other major solution is synthetic kerosene made from CO2 and H2O, via electricity. The fuel is more expensive though, so it's only suited for short haul flights where fuel is a small cpart of the ticket.
Sounds great, except that I have a beef with maintaining growth of the aircraft industry at the same time. We are in a crisis. Our house is on fire. Why should we risk the worst for the sake of the growth of the airline industry. My god man.
Airlines are a tiny fraction of all emissions. Eating meat has a FAR bigger impact, yet no one wants to talk about it or how we can address this huge issue (and no, I'm not a vegan, but that doesn't mean they are wrong).
@@BXJ-mi9mm this bickering about this produces more than that is pointless and counterproductive. Yes, we need to eat less meat, yes we need to fly less, yes the flights we do make needs to be more efficient, yes we need to reduce driving, yes we need to switch the cars that we do need to electric, yes we need to shut down fossil fuel power plants. We need all of these things combined and MORE if we are to have any chance whatsoever of maintaining a planet inhabitable to humans over the next century.
If your house is on fire, maybe the raging inferno around the broken gas main is more worthy of your attention than the small candle sitting by itself in the corner. Going after the biggest source of the problem, and cutting that off, is usually more productive than getting distracted by minor factors.
@@MsSomeonenew Relying on a power source that generates massive amounts of heat to charge batteries to run electric fans at variable speeds (each step adding cost and and increasing energy losses) and minimising resistance using superconductors, a technology that only works at super low temperatures that would rely on either a massive cooling system to keep at those low temperatures stable or massive super low temperature heat sinks (like bathing all of the fans in liquid nitrogen) that hopefully won't flash boil and cause a pressure explosion when it boils because there's a turbojet engine right next to it and lift generating heat or that those cooling systems don't screw with the aluminium's mechanical performance too much. You might as well be launching passenger rockets based off ICBM designs and give passengers parachutes to disembark with, or genetically engineer pegasus instead of this insane idea. His idea is pure sci-fi fantasy. If anyone manages to build that brain fart of a concept no airline would ever buy it, they'd go with one of the far and away more practical plans on how to generate low carbon or carbon neutral liquid fuels, that chemistry is a million times easier and the infrastructure a hundred times faster to roll out than replacing any sort of fleet of jets they'll have in the next 20 years.
So you're telling me we're going to replace every jet with hybrid by 2035 and then replace *all of them again* with battery electric? Is all that manufacturing even worth the gains?
Sorry, but even if this technology is workable, we still need to change our lifestyle if we want to reduce emissions. And this promisses business as usual. Wishful thinking.
The only viable solution is to produce carbon neutral, liquid hydrocarbon fuels for use in existing aircraft. The technology already exists, it's FAR more viable than most of the technologies mentioned in this video and it would *eliminate* CO2 emissions from aircraft, not just reduce them. - It also should be considered that most airliners fly for many decades before being retired, so even if these hybrid aircraft were in production, they wouldn't begin to significantly reduce the CO2 emissions from the aviation sector for a *long* time.
What a scintillating ray of hope! Jet aircraft are almost certainly the primary driver of climate change, The problem is the massive heat exhausted into a frigid zone. We need to accomplish this change much sooner, and we should be offering massive incentives and rewards for this type of non-polluting and especially, cool running, air transport. One key technology which might hasten the arrival of this type of aircraft may well be including the fuselage as a part of the battery, or power cell, storage and photoelectric systems to assist in the flight of the plane. With current technology the entire skin of the aircraft can be made from solar collectors, both absorbing electrical force and heat, Heat differential between the upper and lower surfaces of the aircraft are another potential source of energy. The actually texture of the aircraft may be fine tuned to reduce friction or possibly even to generate power. Thank you sir for this absolutely essential work with super conductors, they will also play a big part in the development of solar powered high speed trains, employing mag-lev, polarity braking, and low voltage photoelectric power.
It's all too far fetched to consumer minds, as always they will only wait what engineers actually make for them. This is a mere engineering problem, only question is if anyone wants to finance it.
This makes no sense whatsoever. A fan-powered 737-style a/c would be MUCH slower and have a MUCH lower ceiling - so be inherently LESS efficient. Why carry the weight of the electric-motors anyway - if you can just use a more-or-less conventional turbo-prop. As for these motors - it doesnn't matter HOW light they are - they STILL will NOT be able to compete with a turbofan for speed and altitude. As for all the talk of throttling the engines - wrong - existing turbofans are optimised for cruise performance already.... Descending they much less, and only at take-off is the fuel-flow at maximum. Electric flight does have a future - but for slower, low to medium altitude operations - no real help whatsoever, for an isolated island like New Zealand.
No, an electric fan motor can take your airplane higher as it doesn't need extra air for combustion and recover power on the way down, making it a far more efficient overall system. But since his idea relies on a jet engine it would still be limited to conventional flight.
@@MsSomeonenew ;- You don't get 'something for nothing'. The energy still needs to be generated. Each fan on a modern turbofan has it's own dedicated gas-turbine - also adding thrust. An electric system need to carry generators and motors - as well as the gas-turbines to run it all, along with all of the consequential losses. The energy-recovery during decent isn't very realistic either, as it'd probably lead to an excessive rate of decent. Overall - the system is half-baked.
This is the kind of person who needs more publicity, people who promote actual alternate solutions instead of simply crying and throwing a tantrum like greta thunberg
Adding this mass and the efficiency it brings, should cut mass of fuel carried by about 30%. Even if not viable yet, it is a significant step. After all, we did move from piston prop to jet turbine over time as the tech was developed.
I guess the idea is to run the turbines 100% all of the time. Store the surplus and use the stored energy in for example duribg take off. R This would allow for smaller read lighter turbines. But the weight lost will be redistributed using heavier motors. Hence the need for lighter and more effective motors and of course the energy storage. Toyota has been develeping super capacitors allowing to store energy in the body work, maybe same thing could be developed using the plane fuselage as a super capacitor.
@@andrasbiro3007 The only working hyperloop concepts in existence are maglevs, AIR BEARINGS DON'T WORK IN A VACUUM. How many times does that need to be explained to you? - The passenger throughput of a hyperloop is reduced by the need for an airlock, which makes the drag reduction that the tunnel provides completely meaningless.
@@PistonAvatarGuy How many times I have to explain this to you? The hyperloop does not use vacuum. It uses very low pressure, but there's still some air. And actually air bearings work better in low pressure environments, because they use pressure difference, so less external pressure means less air have to be pumped under the vehicle. Actually, it would absolutely work in vacuum, but it would obviously ruin the vacuum quickly. Pods don't have to go through a single airlock, there could be hundreds at stations, if necessary. And even if there's just a single airlock, that can be designed to be very fast in many ways. It doesn't have to be a true airlock, it doesn't matter is a little air gets through. One design I can imagine uses multiple stages, each separated by sliding doors that can open and close at a fraction of a second. These open just enough to let the pod through. And in each stage powerful pumps get rid most of the air that got in. Another possibility is a plasma window, but that's a real power hog, so probably not the most ideal thing here. The throughput of the system would be limited by the minimum safe distance between pods, which could be pretty short.
@@andrasbiro3007 Air bearings depend on having a certain volume of air to create a cushion and it becomes VERY difficult to move enough air to create that bearing when it's operating in a very low pressure environment. If you have enough air in the system that it's easy to create an air bearing, your vehicle will encounter significant resistance and it will probably start running into issues with shock wave formation at relatively low speeds. The lower the air pressure, the slower the speed of sound. - The other issue with the air bearing is that it seems to have been made to accommodate an on-board battery, which is something that's absolutely insane to have when you have a vehicle following a track. Why not just power the vehicle through the track, instead of having a battery that's going to need to charge every time the vehicle stops, wear out quickly and cost a fortune to replace on a regular basis? This is why a maglev system makes infinitely more sense. - "...there could be hundreds at stations..." - Yes, if this were Happy Stoner Gumdrop Land and cost weren't an issue, sure! - "...it doesn't matter is a little air gets through..." - Screw efficiency, right? - "One design I can imagine uses multiple stages, each separated by sliding doors that can open and close at a fraction of a second. " - Again, no thought given to cost. - "Another possibility is a plasma window, but that's a real power hog, so probably not the most ideal thing here." - Stupidity level: OVER 9000! (Gotta speak your language, right?) This would be a good way to turn the pod, and the people inside, into ash!
In all honesty, I started as a climate change denier until I started hearing just absolute nonsensical things from other denialists like Tony Heller. I stopped paying attention to social media, pundits, bureaucrats, and politicians. I started reading the actual research papers (not blogs, videos, or independent publishers). Climate change is not difficult to understand. Like weather, there are limited factors which affect climate. Understanding what they are and how they interact isn’t difficult.
As for battery technology, forget it. Go flow-cell or go super-capacitor. Those technologies are ready today to meet these challenges, they just have to be properly repackaged and scaled for such a thing as commercial flight, but the technology is available now to do so. We already have small planes flying electrically using conventional Li-Ion battery tech. Larger planes are an eventuality given improving battery tech or changing tracks and going chemical storage like flow-cell batteries or using super-capacitor arrays with sophisticated monitoring and energy management. You could even do it today without having to have super-conducting motors using those more energy-dense solutions.
i doubt the superconductors. i do believe in some form of hybrid planes though. the first thing to be done is replace 2 big engines with alot of smaller electric fans. possibly above the wing trailing edge to improve aerodynamics as well. that way it should be possible to get away with losing only some passengers to higher mass and still have an advante over a traditional system. the power density of the motor doesnt have to match the turbine. it only needs to be economic for an airline by being not as much heavier (losing seats and sold tickets) as fuel consumption saved.
One big snag, the battery technology. In my opinion the batteries needed for this idea will never exist. There is a physical limit to how small a battery can be before internal short circuiting causes them to go up in flames. Already lithium ion batteries are very close to the limit. In fact they sometimes go up in flames in EVs and the auxiliary power batteries in aircraft. Batteries will always be too big and heavy for use in powering passenger liners like the 737.
I do not like the delta-wing aircraft shown in Your last picture. Buying the economic maximum at the price of airodynamic instability nonsense! The reduction in CO2 and increase in efficiency by using electric-driven aircraft, wont suffice. it is necessary to change from jet-fuel to methane or LNG-turbine technology, too. That would afford a free coolant for Your Superconductor Motor or at least a low temp heat-sink!
Electric planes are prefect for short flights and regional flights (remember: if they start designing a regional plane now, it will take a decade for it to enter service). Biofuels could easily be used for long distance flights and self-driving vehicles will make regional flights pretty redundant anyway.
Future air travel is going to be limited to long-haul or over water. Self-driving cars make regional jets pointless because you can get their just as fast via car for a lot less hassle and money.
@@BXJ-mi9mm By joining up main cities and if maglev tech becomes common. Trains would actually be faster than planes across most countries due to less time to board and the high speed of maglev.
@@PeteS_1994 The big problem with maglev is that it is completely incompatible with traditional trains with little benefit, especially in terms of costs. If you are going to go maglev, you might as well put it in a tube (which is also a very old idea but recently revived by Musk). I think it would be cool to put a "maglev highway" between cities, though. Imagine that… Self driving vehicles that hover over the grass or even a (extremely) short crop. I don't know about you, but I hate how much pavement there is. Maybe someday that will be done in very natural areas, but that is a big "maybe."
@@BXJ-mi9mm Even not underground there are benefits to maglev I think. Sure it's not in a vacuum going the faster it can but there are less moving parts which means it should be easier or cheaper to maintain. It's just that the infrastructure to build it would initially be very expensive.
it's a neat idea, but if this can reduce emissions by 70% by reducing fuel consumption by 70%, then wouldn't this mean carbon neutral e-kerosene could afford to be over 3x the price of regular kerosene for aviation to remain at the same price point? or we could have a blend of fossil kerosene and e-kerosene? which would mean emissions could be dropped even further? also notably absent from this discussion: hydrogen - already much much lighter than batteries, and fuel cells - which with sufficient weight reduction could achieve higher efficiency than a turboshaft generator, other alternative fuel possibilities - ammonia, e-methanol
We should launch aircraft and space rockets to altitude via lighter than air balloons that could be reusable, automated and solar powered. We should switch to electric vehicles and aircraft which should also be solar powered.
This concept is kinda a double edged sword because if you went full electric, there’s a higher chance you’ll have ice build up in the motor and that alone could bring down a plane. That with heavy batteries is a recipe for disaster, that aircraft would need a lot of anti-ice equipment onboard to be able to handle flight in cold weather, let alone even operate in cold weather. Good idea, but this is way ahead of our time.
You think you know better than the people making these planes? BEV planes are already far better for flight school, skydiving, and other very short range uses. There is a lot of potential here.
B5429671 XJ No, but I’m a pilot, and I have an understanding of aerodynamics and heat. Electric motors don’t produce enough heat to prevent icing above 30,000 feet. This ted talk was about commercial applications, not general aviation. I agree that there are a lot of benefits for electric aircraft, but it would be dangerous to operate at high altitudes, making it not feasible for commercial air travel with current noise ordinances.
Pipe dream ? No evidence in this video either way. Don't show us the money , show us the tech. More realistic title for video might be , "Scientist working on future of Airplanes realises 11 years have gone down the drain and wishes he had gone bush and learnt to live of the land instead" lol
Perhaps heavier than air will become old tech. Bring back the hydrogen airship, it’s fuel gives it lift. Make it very big, with a solar skin, maybe one day one that photosynthesis water vapour into hydrogen. We may have to enjoy taking twice as long in the air, but hey, plenty of space to enjoy the cruise. I cannot see why the safety concerns will not be addressed. We already fly around sitting on a huge tank of aviation fuel.
@@andrasbiro3007 Did you look up William Happer? Or listen to any of his lectures or interviews? In case you don't know - he's a Nobel Prize-winning scientist whose actual job involved the subject at hand. Do you understand, for example, the whole concept of positive feedback? How about the so-called "forcing" that ostensibly takes place? How about computer modeling? The first part of your lecture talked about how reliable and efficient jet engines already are. Would you trade safety to eke out a fraction more ( alleged ) efficiency? The airlines, plane manufacturers, and engine manufacturers already want to increase efficiency as much as possible due to market forces. Unless or until we can have something approaching their safety record, you won't see me flying in an electric or hybrid aircraft.
@@Jollyprez I don't have to look him up, because the science is extremely clear about climate change. It doesn't matter what one guy says, when the evidence against his theory is overwhelming. I suggest you listen to all the other climate scientists too and then see if you still believe this one guy. But I did look him up anyway, and unsurprisingly I found that he isn't even a climate scientist. More efficient engines aren't enough, we have to get to net zero carbon emission to survive. That means electric jets eventually, and then efficiency won't be a big concern, since we will get all of our electricity from clean sources.
well surprisingly it is not tourists that fill up most of that 10%. think about the charging cable that u order from ebay china, think about the bussiness convention in onother city/country or a bussiness deal with a foreign partner. bussiness and cargo are way more than the family that takes a vacation somewhere far once in 5 years.... ( ihave read statistics but my awesome memory doesnt want me to cite any numbers....)
Or don't because CO2 is not a real problem, it's a very weak warmer, with a logarithmic forcing/concentration curve that is basically saturated as it is. The human contribution since the start of the industrial age is not as big as you'd think, back then it was at 284ppm, and it has since then risen to 410ppm, however the majority of that can be attributed to natural sources, and our portion of that 126ppm rise is only about 15ppm, or about 3.6% of the total, so even if we stop emitting it entirely it will only go down by that amount, and that would yield only about a 0.2 deg C reduction in temperature. Human caused temperature rise.... T = (3.7(log(410/284)/log(2))) - (3.7(log(395/284)/log(2))) = 0.2C This information and the science behind it is easily accessible, but it's much easier to just accept what you're told that a fictional 97% (75/77) say is going on. It's ironic that people say they don't trust the GOVERNMENT, but they're all too ready to trust an interGOVERNMENTAL panel of policy makers.
So you think you are smarter then all climate scientist combined? Also, you forgot the other effects of CO2, ocean acidification for example. Or it's effect on our brain.
Hydrogen fuel cells are more than capable of solving this issue today. And within 5 years there will be solid state battery technology capable of use in the aerospace industry as well. They will weigh 30% less, hold 3x as much energy, last 10x as long and they cannot freeze nor ever explode. You can cut a piece out of them and they still function. No more precious metals and cobalt from the congo. 60% cheaper to produce. Over $8 billion was invested last year by all the majors for its commercialization. Its a proven technology across numerous chemistries.
@@jayreiter268 Fine, I'll be more specific: The hydrogen fuel cell and fuel storage system weighs more than batteries and takes up significantly more space inside of a vehicle. This is why the Toyota Mirai (despite having less range and significantly less power) weighs more than the Tesla Model 3 and why its such a tall, weird shape when compared to the Tesla. Fuel cell aircraft also aren't anymore capable than battery electric aircraft, which is why they're almost all extremely slow motorgliders.
![ฮักเทื่อสุดท้าย - บอย ศิริชัย [OFFICIAL MV]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/-1PoPoQ-B-k/mqdefault.jpg)
I think this is a great idea. Keep going. I'm all for turbo-electric aircraft. There are lots of haters in the comments here but I stand with this guy.
He was the most under-rated of the Three Stooges.
Superconductivity is now at 233K (-40C) which is about the temperature at 30,000 ft. So the superconducting material needs to be super cooled on the way up and the way down. Personally I think assisted takeoff will provide more fuel savings than hybrid power trains. Current engines are large enough to get lift, but an awful lot of mass to carry for 10000 miles. Assisted take off allows making the engines smaller, and hence much more efficient for the remainder of the journey.
hows the batteries work at -40?
@@justinjay6930 Depends on the battery. Solid state batteries will work fine. For the current generation of batteries, you keep them encased, and they will produce plenty of heat as the motor draws down on them. The batteries will be much more efficient at lower temperatures.
@Capt777harris You would only need cooling liquid on the way up. You could always compress the air at altitude for the descent. The problem of takeoff remains though. Turbofans are extremely efficient at high altitude. You can move the plane on one small engine, but you have to carry two very large engines for the whole trip, just because you needed those engines to take off.
I don't think you can expect to rely on superconductive effects on aircraft, at least not with current physics we know. It's not enough to establish a superconductivity record in the lab, under optimal conditions. As you increase the magnetic field strength and the current density, you need colder temperatures to maintain the superconducting state. (I didn't know superconductivity had been achieved at such an absolutely torrid temperature! If so, that's really exciting. Seriously. I'm going to check it out, so thanks for the tip!)
Well, I checked it out, and I haven't found any mention of any temperature over minus 70 C. And of course, that's just a lab experiment. Where did you find a claim of minus 40?
How can a drive train be more efficient than providing propulsion directly from thrust?
1.5 temperature increase per century is today's reality by 50 years of satellite measurements, by Christy, University, Huntsville, Ala.
What temperature superconductors....
Make sure your aircraft are full
With all the developments in electric VTOLs, I was looking for information about what the airline industry was doing to combat fuel use & begin to convert to some form of hybrid electric solution. Amazingly, I didn't have to look far! This is an exciting, workable idea, that I sincerely hope *_will_* be implemented as soon as possible. Thanks for an inspiring talk! 𝒕𝒂𝒗𝒊.
Inorder to make aircrafts fully electric we need battery energy density of more than 20 kwh/kg so can safely land. Which is not possible to get from current batteries.
The Faster way to go green with aviation is to adopt carbon neutral fuels like biofuels and synthetic fuels produced by CO² capture from the atmosphere using renewable energy sources.
The Future is in recycling "CO²".
Nitheesh Kumar not to mention how we produce the electric power to charge those batteries once they exist.
@1:30 "We have signed up to keeping total aviation emissions at the current level." Not good enough. The IPCC says global carbon emissions need to be net zero by 2050. Better to invest the research dollars in sustainable aviation fuel.
Aviation is increasing, but it's still a small portion of the total, and has spent every year since the 70s working on efficiency, and is continuing. How about before you focus on them too much, we look at the 90% of the economy that's been dragging its rear on the topic. You get more reduction that way.
One thing is to reduce the need for air-transportation of consumer packages. Items produced overseas or hundreds of miles away can be cached locally at warehouses after slower shipping by boats or ground transport allowing for instant and quick ground-transit from local warehouses instead of requiring air transport from overseas or other regions. It just requires more careful advanced planning and more wide-spread distribution of products to meet the "buy it now" demands of consumers using much more efficient and less enviro-costly ground transit instead of air transit. People also could use train transit as oppose to air transit for regional hops. Few things require the speed of air transport for intra-state distances. Most things that require transporting items with urgency are great examples of complete failure to plan for the near term and long term maintenances and needs for such things, to have critical items on hand for when critical items fail so overnight shipping doesn't become a "need".
The best way to decreased air emissions (for package and material transport) is to use less air sevices as a substitute for proper medium and long term planning and good maintenance practices. People are lazy, and they want everything yesterday, so just never mind what I just said. lol
Matt Carrell not to mention on what non-green circumstances those items are produced and what these item actually are.
Time stamp for electric motors 3:28
great idea!
Rod Babcock is his name
I'm just saying
Corona says Yes
I’d be interested to see a model which can be completed with current tech. Only potential issue is weight distribution imho
CO2 from commercial aviation is a very low percentage of human generated C02 from non-renewable sources.
Hybrid Electric planes will only be popular if they provide airlines with lower operational costs (ie the fuel savings must dramatically exceed the added cost) .. ironically, Money is the path to Green
@@djp3637 Agreed, fuel cost is a huge factor .. and so is Weight, as this video points out, if they can get the weight down, a hybrid system could provide lower operational costs overall .. only then we will see it in use... which is what I originally stated.
@@djp3637 Keep in mind, up-front costs are weighted. 10M now is much more expensive than 10M over 25 years.
@@bob15479 Depends on the cost of capital. The important point of this video is that reducing engine size on aircraft is a virtuous circle. Less mass means less fuel, which in turn means less mass. If we could fire energy at the aircraft from the ground, air travel would be very cheap indeed.
Complete believer that a gas turbine can be used to generate power that can be then used to run electric ducted fans. Have to see if one day batteries get light enough but the GT as a power supplier should work nicely!
Flying is incredibly efficient, in fact more efficient than driving a Prius if you measure passenger mpg
Yes but in a couple of hours you can make as much more miles than a Prius or any other car will do in a year. Thats the problem. Also Kerosene releases more co2 molécules by its chemical composition.
Hi there, would I be able to use some of this footage for my non-commercial school documentary project about electric aircrafts?
Lox / LH would not only provide fuel but also cool down the superconductive elements into their workable ranges. Similarly, housing the magnets into the engine venting, thereby turning the fans from the outside rather than the center might yield some interesting efficiencies in itself.
Hydrogen is not a fuel. It is an energy carrier and a lousy one at that. Airlines around the world use about 100 billion gallons of fuel. The US an brazil together produce enough biofuels to cover at least a quarter of that today.
all sorts of possibilities if you're using hydrolox, for example you could spec the motors for cruise power, and use lightweight rocket thrusters or turbopumps for adding extra power for take off
or you could skip having turbines, and use fuel cells to provide electrical power, again using the cryogenic LH2/LOX to cut down on the weight that would normally be required for watercooling the fuel cell stack
and perhaps most interestingly of all, you wouldn't have your engine performance limited by altitude, so the plane could fly higher up to reduce drag (possibly again using LH2/LOX to cool the skin of the aircraft to avoid heating problems?)
of course the LOX is going to be adding a lot of weight vs. using atmospheric oxygen, so not sure if it's really worth it unless you're aiming for super high speeds, eg. a suborbital rocket, or hypersonic spaceplane
Without a mechanically reliable high temperature superconductor, and we don't have those, or a large cooling mechanism on the plane, this is not a ready solution. Better models of conventional motors are hitting greater performance thresholds and might make this viable for routes up to 1000-2000km in the near future.
The other major solution is synthetic kerosene made from CO2 and H2O, via electricity. The fuel is more expensive though, so it's only suited for short haul flights where fuel is a small cpart of the ticket.
Sounds great, except that I have a beef with maintaining growth of the aircraft industry at the same time. We are in a crisis. Our house is on fire. Why should we risk the worst for the sake of the growth of the airline industry. My god man.
Airlines are a tiny fraction of all emissions. Eating meat has a FAR bigger impact, yet no one wants to talk about it or how we can address this huge issue (and no, I'm not a vegan, but that doesn't mean they are wrong).
@@BXJ-mi9mm this bickering about this produces more than that is pointless and counterproductive. Yes, we need to eat less meat, yes we need to fly less, yes the flights we do make needs to be more efficient, yes we need to reduce driving, yes we need to switch the cars that we do need to electric, yes we need to shut down fossil fuel power plants. We need all of these things combined and MORE if we are to have any chance whatsoever of maintaining a planet inhabitable to humans over the next century.
@@dijikstra8 exactly. It's so frustrating when people try to not pick and say one thing is worse then the other.
If your house is on fire, maybe the raging inferno around the broken gas main is more worthy of your attention than the small candle sitting by itself in the corner. Going after the biggest source of the problem, and cutting that off, is usually more productive than getting distracted by minor factors.
The short answer: No, cuz I'm an AvGeek 😭😭😭😭😭
Flying at lower speeds would be greener.
The plane needs to fly faster in order to get airborne. Slow plane would never take off.
So this guy's solution is science fiction.
As he made clear, we have all the pieces for it to work. Just a question of who wants to pay for R&D.
@@MsSomeonenew Relying on a power source that generates massive amounts of heat to charge batteries to run electric fans at variable speeds (each step adding cost and and increasing energy losses) and minimising resistance using superconductors, a technology that only works at super low temperatures that would rely on either a massive cooling system to keep at those low temperatures stable or massive super low temperature heat sinks (like bathing all of the fans in liquid nitrogen) that hopefully won't flash boil and cause a pressure explosion when it boils because there's a turbojet engine right next to it and lift generating heat or that those cooling systems don't screw with the aluminium's mechanical performance too much.
You might as well be launching passenger rockets based off ICBM designs and give passengers parachutes to disembark with, or genetically engineer pegasus instead of this insane idea. His idea is pure sci-fi fantasy.
If anyone manages to build that brain fart of a concept no airline would ever buy it, they'd go with one of the far and away more practical plans on how to generate low carbon or carbon neutral liquid fuels, that chemistry is a million times easier and the infrastructure a hundred times faster to roll out than replacing any sort of fleet of jets they'll have in the next 20 years.
So you're telling me we're going to replace every jet with hybrid by 2035 and then replace *all of them again* with battery electric? Is all that manufacturing even worth the gains?
There is no significant warming in the first place, plenty of time to get a hybrid done right, provided it is more economical and/or safer
I think it's called "Stop flying everywhere just because you can."
Sorry, but even if this technology is workable, we still need to change our lifestyle if we want to reduce emissions. And this promisses business as usual. Wishful thinking.
I believe it is already downgraded by 70 percent
The only viable solution is to produce carbon neutral, liquid hydrocarbon fuels for use in existing aircraft. The technology already exists, it's FAR more viable than most of the technologies mentioned in this video and it would *eliminate* CO2 emissions from aircraft, not just reduce them.
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It also should be considered that most airliners fly for many decades before being retired, so even if these hybrid aircraft were in production, they wouldn't begin to significantly reduce the CO2 emissions from the aviation sector for a *long* time.
what like Spacex's proposed methane created through solar power?
What a scintillating ray of hope! Jet aircraft are almost certainly the primary driver of climate change, The problem is the massive heat exhausted into a frigid zone. We need to accomplish this change much sooner, and we should be offering massive incentives and rewards for this type of non-polluting and especially, cool running, air transport. One key technology which might hasten the arrival of this type of aircraft may well be including the fuselage as a part of the battery, or power cell, storage and photoelectric systems to assist in the flight of the plane. With current technology the entire skin of the aircraft can be made from solar collectors, both absorbing electrical force and heat, Heat differential between the upper and lower surfaces of the aircraft are another potential source of energy. The actually texture of the aircraft may be fine tuned to reduce friction or possibly even to generate power.
Thank you sir for this absolutely essential work with super conductors, they will also play a big part in the development of solar powered high speed trains, employing mag-lev, polarity braking, and low voltage photoelectric power.
This approach seems a tad far fetched. A tad Rube Goldberg. Those that comment below also seems skeptical.
It's all too far fetched to consumer minds, as always they will only wait what engineers actually make for them. This is a mere engineering problem, only question is if anyone wants to finance it.
This makes no sense whatsoever. A fan-powered 737-style a/c would be MUCH slower and have a MUCH lower ceiling - so be inherently LESS efficient. Why carry the weight of the electric-motors anyway - if you can just use a more-or-less conventional turbo-prop. As for these motors - it doesnn't matter HOW light they are - they STILL will NOT be able to compete with a turbofan for speed and altitude. As for all the talk of throttling the engines - wrong - existing turbofans are optimised for cruise performance already.... Descending they much less, and only at take-off is the fuel-flow at maximum. Electric flight does have a future - but for slower, low to medium altitude operations - no real help whatsoever, for an isolated island like New Zealand.
No, an electric fan motor can take your airplane higher as it doesn't need extra air for combustion and recover power on the way down, making it a far more efficient overall system.
But since his idea relies on a jet engine it would still be limited to conventional flight.
@@MsSomeonenew ;- You don't get 'something for nothing'. The energy still needs to be generated. Each fan on a modern turbofan has it's own dedicated gas-turbine - also adding thrust. An electric system need to carry generators and motors - as well as the gas-turbines to run it all, along with all of the consequential losses. The energy-recovery during decent isn't very realistic either, as it'd probably lead to an excessive rate of decent. Overall - the system is half-baked.
It's ironic how he notes how the nasa design wouldn't be possible without the super efficient motors he speaks of and the 737 max situation.
This is the kind of person who needs more publicity, people who promote actual alternate solutions instead of simply crying and throwing a tantrum like greta thunberg
You'd only be adding mass. I can't see this working.
Adding this mass and the efficiency it brings, should cut mass of fuel carried by about 30%. Even if not viable yet, it is a significant step. After all, we did move from piston prop to jet turbine over time as the tech was developed.
I guess the idea is to run the turbines 100% all of the time. Store the surplus and use the stored energy in for example duribg take off. R
This would allow for smaller read lighter turbines. But the weight lost will be redistributed using heavier motors. Hence the need for lighter and more effective motors and of course the energy storage. Toyota has been develeping super capacitors allowing to store energy in the body work, maybe same thing could be developed using the plane fuselage as a super capacitor.
hyper loop is it then
Open-air maglevs are better, you don't really gain anything by putting pods in tubes.
@@PistonAvatarGuy
Hyperloop is still not maglev. And you gain higher top speed with a small fraction of the power, because there's almost no drag.
@@andrasbiro3007 The only working hyperloop concepts in existence are maglevs, AIR BEARINGS DON'T WORK IN A VACUUM. How many times does that need to be explained to you?
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The passenger throughput of a hyperloop is reduced by the need for an airlock, which makes the drag reduction that the tunnel provides completely meaningless.
@@PistonAvatarGuy
How many times I have to explain this to you? The hyperloop does not use vacuum. It uses very low pressure, but there's still some air. And actually air bearings work better in low pressure environments, because they use pressure difference, so less external pressure means less air have to be pumped under the vehicle. Actually, it would absolutely work in vacuum, but it would obviously ruin the vacuum quickly.
Pods don't have to go through a single airlock, there could be hundreds at stations, if necessary. And even if there's just a single airlock, that can be designed to be very fast in many ways. It doesn't have to be a true airlock, it doesn't matter is a little air gets through. One design I can imagine uses multiple stages, each separated by sliding doors that can open and close at a fraction of a second. These open just enough to let the pod through. And in each stage powerful pumps get rid most of the air that got in. Another possibility is a plasma window, but that's a real power hog, so probably not the most ideal thing here.
The throughput of the system would be limited by the minimum safe distance between pods, which could be pretty short.
@@andrasbiro3007 Air bearings depend on having a certain volume of air to create a cushion and it becomes VERY difficult to move enough air to create that bearing when it's operating in a very low pressure environment. If you have enough air in the system that it's easy to create an air bearing, your vehicle will encounter significant resistance and it will probably start running into issues with shock wave formation at relatively low speeds. The lower the air pressure, the slower the speed of sound.
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The other issue with the air bearing is that it seems to have been made to accommodate an on-board battery, which is something that's absolutely insane to have when you have a vehicle following a track. Why not just power the vehicle through the track, instead of having a battery that's going to need to charge every time the vehicle stops, wear out quickly and cost a fortune to replace on a regular basis? This is why a maglev system makes infinitely more sense.
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"...there could be hundreds at stations..."
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Yes, if this were Happy Stoner Gumdrop Land and cost weren't an issue, sure!
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"...it doesn't matter is a little air gets through..."
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Screw efficiency, right?
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"One design I can imagine uses multiple stages, each separated by sliding doors that can open and close at a fraction of a second. "
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Again, no thought given to cost.
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"Another possibility is a plasma window, but that's a real power hog, so probably not the most ideal thing here."
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Stupidity level: OVER 9000! (Gotta speak your language, right?) This would be a good way to turn the pod, and the people inside, into ash!
Most of the time engines are only at full speed during takeoff alone....
In all honesty, I started as a climate change denier until I started hearing just absolute nonsensical things from other denialists like Tony Heller.
I stopped paying attention to social media, pundits, bureaucrats, and politicians.
I started reading the actual research papers (not blogs, videos, or independent publishers).
Climate change is not difficult to understand. Like weather, there are limited factors which affect climate. Understanding what they are and how they interact isn’t difficult.
Here's how: Fly less
Of course! Take the train over the ocean!
Maybe we should be hunter gatherers again
As for battery technology, forget it. Go flow-cell or go super-capacitor. Those technologies are ready today to meet these challenges, they just have to be properly repackaged and scaled for such a thing as commercial flight, but the technology is available now to do so. We already have small planes flying electrically using conventional Li-Ion battery tech. Larger planes are an eventuality given improving battery tech or changing tracks and going chemical storage like flow-cell batteries or using super-capacitor arrays with sophisticated monitoring and energy management. You could even do it today without having to have super-conducting motors using those more energy-dense solutions.
unfortunate name...
right on.
i doubt the superconductors.
i do believe in some form of hybrid planes though. the first thing to be done is replace 2 big engines with alot of smaller electric fans. possibly above the wing trailing edge to improve aerodynamics as well. that way it should be possible to get away with losing only some passengers to higher mass and still have an advante over a traditional system. the power density of the motor doesnt have to match the turbine. it only needs to be economic for an airline by being not as much heavier (losing seats and sold tickets) as fuel consumption saved.
You haven't mentioned the weight of the batteries needed to power the fans......
stop saying rucking super!
One big snag, the battery technology. In my opinion the batteries needed for this idea will never exist. There is a physical limit to how small a battery can be before internal short circuiting causes them to go up in flames. Already lithium ion batteries are very close to the limit. In fact they sometimes go up in flames in EVs and the auxiliary power batteries in aircraft. Batteries will always be too big and heavy for use in powering passenger liners like the 737.
You would have said the same thing about lead acid batteries or NiMH before the next better battery.
I do not like the delta-wing aircraft shown in Your last picture. Buying the economic maximum at the price of airodynamic instability nonsense!
The reduction in CO2 and increase in efficiency by using electric-driven aircraft, wont suffice. it is necessary to change from jet-fuel to methane or LNG-turbine technology, too. That would afford a free coolant for Your Superconductor Motor or at least a low temp heat-sink!
Electric planes are prefect for short flights and regional flights (remember: if they start designing a regional plane now, it will take a decade for it to enter service). Biofuels could easily be used for long distance flights and self-driving vehicles will make regional flights pretty redundant anyway.
Future air travel is going to be limited to long-haul or over water. Self-driving cars make regional jets pointless because you can get their just as fast via car for a lot less hassle and money.
High speed trains as well.
@@PeteS_1994 If you live in a place with a high speed rail line, sure. I wonder how trains are going to fare this transition, though…
@@BXJ-mi9mm By joining up main cities and if maglev tech becomes common. Trains would actually be faster than planes across most countries due to less time to board and the high speed of maglev.
@@PeteS_1994 The big problem with maglev is that it is completely incompatible with traditional trains with little benefit, especially in terms of costs. If you are going to go maglev, you might as well put it in a tube (which is also a very old idea but recently revived by Musk).
I think it would be cool to put a "maglev highway" between cities, though. Imagine that… Self driving vehicles that hover over the grass or even a (extremely) short crop. I don't know about you, but I hate how much pavement there is. Maybe someday that will be done in very natural areas, but that is a big "maybe."
@@BXJ-mi9mm Even not underground there are benefits to maglev I think. Sure it's not in a vacuum going the faster it can but there are less moving parts which means it should be easier or cheaper to maintain. It's just that the infrastructure to build it would initially be very expensive.
it's a neat idea, but if this can reduce emissions by 70% by reducing fuel consumption by 70%, then wouldn't this mean carbon neutral e-kerosene could afford to be over 3x the price of regular kerosene for aviation to remain at the same price point? or we could have a blend of fossil kerosene and e-kerosene? which would mean emissions could be dropped even further?
also notably absent from this discussion: hydrogen - already much much lighter than batteries, and fuel cells - which with sufficient weight reduction could achieve higher efficiency than a turboshaft generator, other alternative fuel possibilities - ammonia, e-methanol
We should launch aircraft and space rockets to altitude via lighter than air balloons that could be reusable, automated and solar powered. We should switch to electric vehicles and aircraft which should also be solar powered.
Bad Rodcock
This concept is kinda a double edged sword because if you went full electric, there’s a higher chance you’ll have ice build up in the motor and that alone could bring down a plane. That with heavy batteries is a recipe for disaster, that aircraft would need a lot of anti-ice equipment onboard to be able to handle flight in cold weather, let alone even operate in cold weather. Good idea, but this is way ahead of our time.
You think you know better than the people making these planes? BEV planes are already far better for flight school, skydiving, and other very short range uses. There is a lot of potential here.
B5429671 XJ No, but I’m a pilot, and I have an understanding of aerodynamics and heat. Electric motors don’t produce enough heat to prevent icing above 30,000 feet. This ted talk was about commercial applications, not general aviation. I agree that there are a lot of benefits for electric aircraft, but it would be dangerous to operate at high altitudes, making it not feasible for commercial air travel with current noise ordinances.
Pipe dream ? No evidence in this video either way. Don't show us the money , show us the tech. More realistic title for video might be , "Scientist working on future of Airplanes realises 11 years have gone down the drain and wishes he had gone bush and learnt to live of the land instead" lol
I agree. I would like to subscribe to your newsletter on this subject. Please contact me via US mail or carrier pigeon.
Perhaps heavier than air will become old tech. Bring back the hydrogen airship, it’s fuel gives it lift. Make it very big, with a solar skin, maybe one day one that photosynthesis water vapour into hydrogen. We may have to enjoy taking twice as long in the air, but hey, plenty of space to enjoy the cruise. I cannot see why the safety concerns will not be addressed. We already fly around sitting on a huge tank of aviation fuel.
*sigh* look up William Happer for what more CO2 will REALLY mean to our world. CO2 is NOT a pollutant.
It is. We already see the harmful effects of climate change and it will get even worse. It's basic physics and common sense.
@@andrasbiro3007 Did you look up William Happer? Or listen to any of his lectures or interviews? In case you don't know - he's a Nobel Prize-winning scientist whose actual job involved the subject at hand. Do you understand, for example, the whole concept of positive feedback? How about the so-called "forcing" that ostensibly takes place? How about computer modeling? The first part of your lecture talked about how reliable and efficient jet engines already are. Would you trade safety to eke out a fraction more ( alleged ) efficiency? The airlines, plane manufacturers, and engine manufacturers already want to increase efficiency as much as possible due to market forces. Unless or until we can have something approaching their safety record, you won't see me flying in an electric or hybrid aircraft.
@@Jollyprez
I don't have to look him up, because the science is extremely clear about climate change. It doesn't matter what one guy says, when the evidence against his theory is overwhelming. I suggest you listen to all the other climate scientists too and then see if you still believe this one guy.
But I did look him up anyway, and unsurprisingly I found that he isn't even a climate scientist.
More efficient engines aren't enough, we have to get to net zero carbon emission to survive. That means electric jets eventually, and then efficiency won't be a big concern, since we will get all of our electricity from clean sources.
@@andrasbiro3007 Ah yes, don't even look at other opinions. Got it.
Turists are causing almost 10% worlds emoissions. Stay at home, sing, plant trees...
well surprisingly it is not tourists that fill up most of that 10%.
think about the charging cable that u order from ebay china, think about the bussiness convention in onother city/country or a bussiness deal with a foreign partner.
bussiness and cargo are way more than the family that takes a vacation somewhere far once in 5 years....
( ihave read statistics but my awesome memory doesnt want me to cite any numbers....)
:)
Or don't because CO2 is not a real problem, it's a very weak warmer, with a logarithmic forcing/concentration curve that is basically saturated as it is.
The human contribution since the start of the industrial age is not as big as you'd think, back then it was at 284ppm, and it has since then risen to 410ppm, however the majority of that can be attributed to natural sources, and our portion of that 126ppm rise is only about 15ppm, or about 3.6% of the total, so even if we stop emitting it entirely it will only go down by that amount, and that would yield only about a 0.2 deg C reduction in temperature.
Human caused temperature rise....
T = (3.7(log(410/284)/log(2))) - (3.7(log(395/284)/log(2))) = 0.2C
This information and the science behind it is easily accessible, but it's much easier to just accept what you're told that a fictional 97% (75/77) say is going on.
It's ironic that people say they don't trust the GOVERNMENT, but they're all too ready to trust an interGOVERNMENTAL panel of policy makers.
So you think you are smarter then all climate scientist combined?
Also, you forgot the other effects of CO2, ocean acidification for example. Or it's effect on our brain.
Ok, ignore the maths, you just believe anything you're told.
Oh and "all the climate scientists" let me guess you really think it is 97%.
Leon, I would suggest you check your numbers. Either they are incorrect or you have misunderstood there meaning.
@@byrnemeister2008 I would suggest you do, because they are not incorrect, you just don't like what they have to say.
Hydrogen fuel cells are more than capable of solving this issue today. And within 5 years there will be solid state battery technology capable of use in the aerospace industry as well. They will weigh 30% less, hold 3x as much energy, last 10x as long and they cannot freeze nor ever explode. You can cut a piece out of them and they still function. No more precious metals and cobalt from the congo. 60% cheaper to produce. Over $8 billion was invested last year by all the majors for its commercialization. Its a proven technology across numerous chemistries.
Hydrogen fuel cells are even larger and heavier than batteries and hydrogen is just another fossil fuel.
To bad I am not a smoker. You must be smoking something really gooood!!
@@jayreiter268 Fine, I'll be more specific: The hydrogen fuel cell and fuel storage system weighs more than batteries and takes up significantly more space inside of a vehicle. This is why the Toyota Mirai (despite having less range and significantly less power) weighs more than the Tesla Model 3 and why its such a tall, weird shape when compared to the Tesla. Fuel cell aircraft also aren't anymore capable than battery electric aircraft, which is why they're almost all extremely slow motorgliders.
@@jayreiter268 Also, hydrogen is reformed from natural gas, it's not a green fuel, it's just fossil fuel industry greenwashing.
@@PistonAvatarGuy LOL, yeah you CAN get it from fossil fuels, but its a lot cheaper just to make it with water and electricity you know. H2O