The CAFE Foundation will hold its sixth Electric Aircraft Symposium on April 27 and 28, 2012 at the Flamingo Resort in Santa Rosa, California and at the Charles M. Schulz Sonoma County Airport, site of the Green Flight Challenge. Not only will there be a stellar lineup of speakers, but flying demonstrations of electric and hybrid aircraft, a first at any EAS. Jack Langelaan, team leader for the GFC-winning Electro Taurus G4 team, and Tine Tomazic from Pipistrel will share insights on the design and flight of the 403.5 epmpg aircraft. David Calley, Chief Technical Officer for Motor Excellence, will describe ideal low-RPM motors for electric aircraft, and Mark Moore from NASA’s Langley Research Center will share breakthroughs in distributed propulsion. And that’s all before the first coffee break! Typical of the packed schedules for all EAS’s, the rest of the presentations will fill your brain and lighten your spirit. Gene Sheehan will discuss his Quickie-like Feuling Green Flight Challenger …
Measuring Up To Standards
ASTM International, formerly known as the American Society for Testing and Materials, develops “international consensus standards” for many industries, using input from its members in many fields and disciplines. Their D-7566-11 “Standard Specification for Aviation Turbine Fuel Containing Synthesized Hydrocarbons” governs what can be put into jet and turbo-prop aircraft. Updated in July 2011, it now allows the use of biologically-derived fuel “without the need for special permissions,” according to SAE International, itself a standards organization, and as reported by Patrick Ponticel. United Airlines was quick to take advantage of the revised standard, using “Solazyme-supplied algae oil that was refined into jet fuel by Honeywell’s UOP division near Houston. The blend used for the November 7, Boeing 737-800 flight was 40-percent Solazyme’s Solajet and 60-percent petroleum-derived commercial jet fuel (Jet-A).” SAE explains that, “Under the ASTM standard, up to 50-percent bio-derived synthetic blending components can be added to conventional jet fuel. These renewable fuel components, called hydroprocessed esters and fatty acids …
Big Birds Flying Green Economy Class (Part Three): Environmental Politics or Revenue Source?
Recent disputes among the many national and regional players in the emerging biofuel/jet fuel markets may slow acceptance and development of hese promising alternatives to fossil fuels. The European Union’s emissions trading system (ETS) seems to be central to contentions by China and the United States. The scheme would impose caps on carbon emissions from airlines flying into Europe, unleashing charges from China that the proposed rules discriminate against carriers from developing countries. A one cent per liter tax on jet fuel, part of the system, is at least partially responsible for the international dispute. According to Flight Global, “The airlines likely to be involved are the nation’s flag carrier Air China, China Southern Airlines and China Eastern Airlines, said an official from the China Air Transport Association.” America has weighed in with court challenges from American Airlines and United Continental, represented by the Air Transport Association (ATA), and Congress has added its voice, opposing what it perceives as European threats to American sovereignty and defending domestic jobs, which it …
Big Birds Flying Green Economy Class (Part Two): Inspire and Aspire
Strategy was almost as important as design in the recent Green Flight Challenge, with near flawless planning and execution of carefully-crafted flight paths by the winning teams. This same precision and use of resources will become more important in a future constrained by increasingly precious fuels. According to Greenaironline.com, “The Indian Ocean Strategic Partnership to Reduce Emissions (Inspire) partnership achieved fuel savings of 3,482kilograms (29,723lb) and carbon dioxide savings of 42,469kg on five flights operated between Australia and the Middle East and South Africa.” These green demonstration flights, according to Greenair, show, “what is what is possible when air navigation service providers (ANSP), airlines and airports work together to remove operational constraints.” Begun in 2010 to “develop gate-to-gate procedures, practice and services” with the goal of reducing fuel use and emissions “across all phases of flight,” Inspire follows Aspire – the Asia and Pacific Initiative to Reduce Emissions – established in February 2008 by Airservices Australia, Airways New Zealand and the U. …
Big Birds Flying Green Economy Class (Part One)
While the world waits for the 10X battery, a safe, long-range source of flight for our post-Green Flight Challenge fliers, we will probably have to go aloft powered by some bio-fuel derivative or combination of “traditional” fossil fuels and biofuel. Major players in the airline industry are responding to the probability that things will get a bit thin in finding ready, cheap sources of sweet crude, and are taking on not only the issue of using green energy, but of flying more efficiently – ala Green Flight Challenge practices and Voyager-type voyages. This interest by the big players in the industry will probably be good for continuing fuel sources for general aviation, too. With more activity than can be imagined in this arena, your editor turns to two excellent sources for background: Flightglobal.com and Greenair Online.com. Recent reports from both show several major successes, but also much political discord between national interest groups that slow progress. We’ll look at a …
How Green was GFC Electricity?
The blog received several comments about the relative energy use of electric aircraft, and how NASA and the CAFE Foundation might have overstated the efficiency and low emissions for the electric aircraft in the competition. Reader Robert Swanson thought the conversion between kilowatt hours and gasoline created a discrepancy. “The discrepancy in performance of gasoline and electric powered aircraft is due to an absurd conversion factor between kWh and gallons of gasoline. The conversion should be calculated from the number of gallons of gasoline consumed by the engine driving the generator used to charge the batteries.” Steven Crow added this objection. “Even after reading the relevant pdf’s, it is far from clear to me how CAFE computed ‘mileage’ for the electric aircraft. The right way of doing it is clear enough: base the mileage on the fossil fuel used to charge the batteries. Electric motors and batteries are not subject to Carnot efficiency limitations. They can seem to be nearly …
Green Flight Challenge Winners
Monday, October 3 was the second day of Nobel Prize announcements, but also marked the Green Flight Challenge Expo, sponsored by Google and staged under the control tower on Moffett Field, home of NASA Ames Research Center, Mountain View, California. The four airplanes that flew in the Challenge at Charles M. Schulz Sonoma Country Airport in Santa Rosa, California were joined by Greg Stevenson’s full-size mockup of his GFC design and a Pipistrel Virus that had won an earlier NASA/CAFE Personal Air Vehicle (PAV) Challenge. Stevenson’s airplane was a reminder that there were numerous entrants that, for a variety of reasons, could not attend. There is a huge number of aircraft in the wings, so to speak, that will fill these pages in the next months and years. 20 exhibitors showed off their visions of a greener future, and three rows of tents protected exhibitors and their displays from the rain that started mid-afternoon. At about 11:00 a.m., attendees were bussed to Building …
Saving the Air While Saving Crops
AvWeb this morning reports on a “highly cost-effective” way to make jet biofuel from renewable materials. According to AvWeb, San Francisco-based, “AliphaJet said its catalytic method uses materials derived from plants and animals such as triglycerides and fatty acids. ‘Our strategy fundamentally improves the economics of making 100-percent drop-in renewable jet biofuel,’ said Jack Oswald, CEO of AliphaJet. ‘Our approach is radically different and unlocks a new industry that can meet the U.S. Navy’s goal of replacing 50 percent of its liquid fuels with renewables by 2020.’ “AliphaJet said its catalytic de-oxygenation process ‘significantly reduces capital and operating costs’ because it does not require the use of hydrogen in processing. That means the processing plant can be less complex, reducing capital costs. It also saves money because the biofuel can be produced close to the site of the raw materials, without the need to be close to a hydrogen source. The company says its process can also produce renewable drop-in …
Google to Sponsor Green Flight Challenge
Green Flight Challenge sponsored by Google to bring historic firsts to aviation Aviation’s largest ever prize to be awarded at Moffett Field October 3 during exposition hosted by NASA SANTA ROSA, CA (July 29, 2011) – The CAFE Foundation announced today that Google will sponsor the NASA Centennial Challenge flight competition known as the Green Flight Challenge (GFC). CAFE (Comparative Aircraft Flight Efficiency) will conduct the event from September 25 through October 2, 2011 at Charles M. Schulz Sonoma County Airport. The NASA-funded prize purse of $1.65M makes this the largest ever prize for aviation. Competing aircraft must demonstrate at least 100 mph and 200 passenger MPG on a 200 mile flight. The aircraft in the Green Flight Challenge sponsored by Google represent a diverse mix of singular prototypes created expressly for the competition by some of the world’s top designers. Most will be propelled by batteries and electric motors, some by bio-fuel or hybrid. All competing aircraft will be …
Serge Pennec, the Gaz’aile, and the 56 Euro Grand Buffet
Americans often speak of the $100 hamburger, the food of choice at some airport café a Cessna hour away from one’s home base. The trip to eat and return often accounts for that sum, with avgas stretching toward $6.00 per gallon. Imagine, then, making a coast-to-coast trip across one’s native land, surveying a dazzling array of scenic delights and partaking of French cuisine along the way – all for not quite that amount. Europe abounds in small, turbocharged Diesel automobiles, sometimes zippy little things that exhibit excellent fuel economy. Many of these cars strive for the “3-liter” designation – the ability to drive 100 kilometers (62 miles) on three liters of fuel (78.4 miles per gallon) and the European Union is pushing toward 95 grams of CO2 emissions per kilometer by 2020. Serge Pennec has built several airplanes using these torquey engines, creating a means of traversing distances cheaply and as greenly as possible. Diesels consume their heavier fuel more frugally than …