TY - JOUR
T1 - Hybrid Electric Powered Multi-Lobed Airship for Sustainable Aviation
AU - Murugaiah, Manikandan
AU - Theng, Darpan F.
AU - Khan, Tabrej
AU - Sebaey, Tamer A.
AU - Singh, Balbir
N1 - Funding Information:
We authors would like to thank Katkuri Aditya Vardhan Reddy and Harsh B. Patil, undergraduate students in the Department of Aeronautical and Automobile Engineering, Manipal Institute of Technology, Manipal, India, for extending their support in performing the calculations and to prepare the manuscript in its present form.The authors would like to acknowledge the support of Prince Sultan University, Riyadh for paying the article processing charge (APC) for this publication.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 by the authors.
PY - 2022/12
Y1 - 2022/12
N2 - The excessive depletion of fossil fuels and increasing environmental concerns have led to the need to explore alternative sources of power for aircraft. This has spurred various stakeholders in the aerospace industry to explore hybrid electric propulsion technology and fully electric vehicles. Airships are aerial platforms based on lighter-than-air systems technology. They have several unique features compared to other vehicles, chiefly their being more environmentally friendly due to low fuel consumption. Among airships, lifting-body dynastats are the most suitable configuration for implementing different levels of hybridization in propulsion systems owing to their large surface-to-volume ratio. The present study deals with the relevance of a hybrid propulsion (conventional engine + electric motor) system and its comparison to conventional ones. An objective function based on envelope volume is formulated to achieve an optimal configuration of a tri-lobed dynastat to carry 10 tons of payload over a 500 km range for specified operating conditions powered by conventional fuel and batteries. The design space is explored assuming a predicted future battery technology level with specific energies ranging from 250 to 750 Wh/kg. Three case studies based on the source of power are investigated: fuel alone, fuel + batteries, and fuel + batteries + solar array. It is seen that the airship can be fully electric with zero carbon emissions but at the expense of a longer length (+18%) and higher envelope volume (+63%) compared to the baseline model.
AB - The excessive depletion of fossil fuels and increasing environmental concerns have led to the need to explore alternative sources of power for aircraft. This has spurred various stakeholders in the aerospace industry to explore hybrid electric propulsion technology and fully electric vehicles. Airships are aerial platforms based on lighter-than-air systems technology. They have several unique features compared to other vehicles, chiefly their being more environmentally friendly due to low fuel consumption. Among airships, lifting-body dynastats are the most suitable configuration for implementing different levels of hybridization in propulsion systems owing to their large surface-to-volume ratio. The present study deals with the relevance of a hybrid propulsion (conventional engine + electric motor) system and its comparison to conventional ones. An objective function based on envelope volume is formulated to achieve an optimal configuration of a tri-lobed dynastat to carry 10 tons of payload over a 500 km range for specified operating conditions powered by conventional fuel and batteries. The design space is explored assuming a predicted future battery technology level with specific energies ranging from 250 to 750 Wh/kg. Three case studies based on the source of power are investigated: fuel alone, fuel + batteries, and fuel + batteries + solar array. It is seen that the airship can be fully electric with zero carbon emissions but at the expense of a longer length (+18%) and higher envelope volume (+63%) compared to the baseline model.
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U2 - 10.3390/aerospace9120769
DO - 10.3390/aerospace9120769
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85144895214
SN - 2226-4310
VL - 9
JO - Aerospace
JF - Aerospace
IS - 12
M1 - 769
ER -