Gizmag readers responded pretty much equally with hope and skepticism to today’s story on Cella Energy’s announcement of their hydrogen-based, emissions-free fuel that would power your car for $1.50 a gallon. One asked if it were April 1 yet. Others held out more charitable views of the announcement, and perhaps deservedly so. Cella’s diagram compares bulky high-pressure storage with room-temperature, ambient-pressure storage solution Cella is partially a spinoff of Oxford University’s ISIS programs, named for the Egyptian goddess of magic and life and overflowing with demonstrated successes. We’ve reported on their Yokeless And Segmented Armature (YASA™) topology motor, a 34-centimeter (13.4 inches) diameter, 7-centimeter (2.76 inches) thick, 11 kilogram (23.2 pound) marvel that can produce a peak 100 kilowatts and 700 Nm (516 foot-pounds) of peak torque. Cella’s web site claims several important factors that would lead to success, including: “Hydrogen fuels for vehicle you can pump like regular gasoline at room temperature and pressure, safer to use than gasoline or …
Boeing’s PhantomEye Powers Up
While AeroVironment’s Global Observer High Altitude Long Endurance aircraft has flown at the NASA Dryden Flight Test Center, Boeing’s PhantomEye HALE is in pieces but undergoing testing prior to being shipped to Dryden. PhantomEye’s hydrogen-fueled engines are being tested at Santa Clarita, California and airframe parts are being prepared for flight at Boeing’s St. Louis, Missouri plant. AeroVironment’s craft has now flown with fuel cells providing electricity to run the four wing-mounted motors. PhantomEye uses hydrogen stored in eight-foot diameter tanks in its fuselage to directly fuel the twin Ford 2.3-liter modified engines. At altitude, a three-stage turbocharger will be required to provide air for an efficient fuel burn. Both unmanned aerial vehicles have similar missions, to fly at 65,000 feet for up to a week at a time while providing surveillance, monitoring, and communication for military and civilian applications.
Garbage to Gasoline, Waste to Wattage?
Dr. Seeley provided several links that reminded this writer of an earlier effort to convert the debris of our affluence into something other than effluent. A Daily Press report from December 21, 2010 by Cory Nealon, showed that at least one lawmaker is aware that there is a “green” aviation industry. “U.S. Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., is spearheading a potential multibillion-dollar endeavor to make Hampton Roads a leader in the emerging field of green aviation. “The effort, which would draw on the region’s rich history of aeronautics research, is in its initial stages of development, Warner said Tuesday. “Preliminary plans include tapping NASA Langley Research Center and partner organizations, such as the National Institute of Aerospace and Science and Technology Corp., all of which are based in Hampton.” The local nature of Senator Warner’s efforts is informative, considering the global nature of climate change and shrinking fossil fuel energy supply issues that must be addressed. Kerry Reals, writing in Flight Global, forecasts …
Flying High on Hydrogen
AeroVironment announced that their Global Observer™ reached an altitude of 5,000 feet (mean sea level) over Edwards Air Force Base and stayed up for four hours – all on its hydrogen-powered electric motors. Having made its first flights last August and September on battery power, the Global Observer on January 11, 2011 successfully demonstrated the system that will allow it to stay airborne for up to a week at a time, staying on station at 65,000 feet. This ability to maintain “persistent” communications and surveillance enables to the Global Observer to be flown in from areas remote from a combat theater or natural disaster location, and to uninterrupted observation of the situation. AeroVironment claims that, “Two Global Observer aircraft, each flying for up to a week at a time, will alternate coverage over any area on the earth, providing a seamless, persistent platform for high value missions such as communications relay, remote sensing, long-term surveillance and border patrol. Offering greater …
It Only Looks Fat
Aviation Week reports on the inner workings of Boeing’s Phantom Eye HALE (High Altitude Long Endurance) unmanned aerial vehicle. The craft, now being tested at NASA Dryden Flight Test Center at Edwards Air Force Base, has a rotund character that shows form does follow function. Wrapping two eight-foot diameter hydrogen tanks in a low-drag pod and boom style fuselage, the “bulbous” but aerodynamic shape seems at variance with its sailplane-like 150-foot wings. Overall, the design’s unlikely look conceals its purpose as well as its enormous fuel tanks. According to Aviation Week, “Boeing’s objective is a production HALE UAV [unmanned aerial vehicle] with an endurance of 10 days, which would enable it to remain on station for four days at 10,000nm [nautical miles] range, or six days at 6,000nm. Three such air vehicles would be able to maintain continuous surveillance anywhere on Earth, [Boeing Phantom Works’ Keith] Monteith says, for a dramatic reduction in cost compared with today’s 24- to 36h-endurance UAVs.” With …
Another Cure for Range Anxiety
Or at least an approach to provide angst-free cross-country flying, as Michael Friend explained in his Electric Aircraft Symposium presentation last April at Rohnert Park, California. Friend, a Boeing engineer closely tied to the company’s early fuel cell work, is the owner and pilot of N787M, one of the earliest production kit Silence Twisters. The Twister is a Spitfire-like, retractable-gear light aircraft capable of cruising 146 on its Jabiru 80-horsepower engine. It’s capable of full aerobatic flight, and was converted to electric power in Germany for possible airshow demonstrations. The Twister’s designers also plan a lengthened wing that would make motor gliding possible. Friend noted the difference in energy density between available batteries and gasoline, explaining that 10 kilograms of gasoline (22 pounds – or about 3.75 gallons) had the energy of 450 kilograms (990 pounds) of lithium batteries. The gasoline cost $10 (April prices) while the battery pack cost $36,000. Despite the fact that the batteries will run through …
The Happiest Materials Scientist
According to his NASA biography, “Dr. Ajay Misra, a member of the Senior Executive Service, is Chief of the Structures and Materials Division in the Research & Technology Directorate at the NASA Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio. In this position, Dr. Misra has the responsibility for planning, advocating, coordinating, organizing, directing and supervising all phases of Division research and business activities.” At the fourth annual Electric Aircraft Symposium in Rohnert Park, California in April 2010, Dr. Misra was among the most charming and happiest of presenters – probably because he had so many happy things to talk about. Much of the joy comes from the continuing revelations about the characteristics of carbon and boron nanotubes. They turn out to be absolutely wonderful for thermal, structural, battery, capacitor and motor applications. Dr. Misra’s talk sounded at times like a pitch for a wonder cure-all, but one backed with solid scientific precepts. Boron nitrate nanotubes have better high-temperature characteristics than carbon …
Thin, Light, Strong, and Energy Dense
2010’s Nobel Prize in Physics went to Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov, who extracted graphene from a piece of graphite when they stuck a piece of adhesive tape to it and peeled away a single atom-thick layer of the thinnest, strongest material in the world. The Nobel Prize web site explains other remarkable properties of this new material. “As a conductor of electricity it performs as well as copper. As a conductor of heat it outperforms all other known materials. It is almost completely transparent, yet so dense that not even helium, the smallest gas atom, can pass through it. Carbon, the basis of all known life on earth, has surprised us once again.” With studies in quantum physics and materials science possible, practical applications loom. “Also a vast variety of practical applications now appear possible including the creation of new materials and the manufacture of innovative electronics. Graphene transistors are predicted to be substantially faster than today’s silicon transistors …
CAFE News: Comparing Apples, Bananas, Oranges and Doughnuts
One of the problems facing judges in the July Green Flight Challenge the CAFE Foundation is managing for NASA is that of determining fairly who gets the best fuel mileage. Since “fuel” in this case can be traditional aviation gasoline, bio-diesel, electricity from batteries or solar panels, or some other energy storage medium, wildly different energy densities have to be taken into account. If TSA “freedom feels” seem intrusive, the scrutiny applied to GFC entrants and their craft will be even more onerous. Aircraft will be impounded once inspected and registered, and the only contact pilots may have with their planes before taking off will be to “top off” their fuel tanks or batteries just before the start of their flight – all under constant monitoring. The widely and wildly differing energy densities for the different forms of motive power require careful definition of energy equivalencies. One pound of gasoline, for instance, equals about 20,000 BTU, or 5.8 kilowatt hours, …
A Record Book for the Filling
The Federation Aeronautique Internationale (FAI), standards setter and record keeper for the aviation world, recently added new classes of records, including those for solar-powered airplanes (CS). Such classes can be broken down by sub-class and category as necessary. Qinetiq’s Zephyr unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) achieved several records in the UAV category in July, and these were made official December 23 by the FAI – a neat Christmas gift to the team. As noted in Qinetiq’s press release: “The FAI has ratified three records which the QinetiQ HALE Team claimed following Zephyr’s long duration flight in July 2010: • Absolute duration record Unmanned – The longest flying UAV in the world (beating Global Hawk’s record by a factor of 11) at 336 hours 22 minutes 8 seconds • Class Record UAV (50-500kg) – Altitude: At a height of 21,562m (which is also 5,000ft higher than Global Hawk, albeit in a different category). • Class Record UAV (50-500kg) – Duration: As above.” In the …