The Possibility of Using Superconducting Magnetic Energy Storage/Battery Hybrid Energy Storage Systems Instead of Generators as Backup Power Sources for Electric Aircraft

Hamoud Alafnan (), Xiaoze Pei, Moanis Khedr, Ibrahim Alsaleh, Abdullah Albaker, Mansoor Alturki and Diaa-Eldin A. Mansour
Additional contact information
Hamoud Alafnan: Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Ha’il, Ha’il 55476, Saudi Arabia
Xiaoze Pei: Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering, University of Bath, Bath BA2 7AY, UK
Moanis Khedr: Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering, University of Bath, Bath BA2 7AY, UK
Ibrahim Alsaleh: Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Ha’il, Ha’il 55476, Saudi Arabia
Abdullah Albaker: Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Ha’il, Ha’il 55476, Saudi Arabia
Mansoor Alturki: Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Ha’il, Ha’il 55476, Saudi Arabia
Diaa-Eldin A. Mansour: Department of Electrical Power Engineering, School of Electronics, Communications and Computer Engineering, Egypt-Japan University of Science and Technology (E-JUST), Alexandria 21934, Egypt

Sustainability, 2023, vol. 15, issue 3, 1-13

Abstract: The annual growth rate of aircraft passengers is estimated to be 6.5%, and the CO 2 emissions from current large-scale aviation transportation technology will continue to rise dramatically. Both NASA and ACARE have set goals to enhance efficiency and reduce the fuel burn, pollution, and noise levels of commercial aircraft. However, such radical improvements require radical solutions. With the current traditional aircraft designs based on gas turbines or piston engines, these goals are infeasible. Small-scale aircraft have successfully proven emission reductions using energy storage systems, such as Alice aircraft. This paper involves an investigation of the possibility of using superconducting magnetic energy storage (SMES)/battery hybrid energy storage systems (HESSs) instead of generators as backup power sources to improve system efficiency and reduce emissions. Two different power system architectures of electric aircraft (EA) were compared in terms of reliability and stability in a one-generator failure scenario. As weight is crucial in EA designs, the weights of the two systems were compared, including the generators and energy storage systems. The two EA systems were built in Simulink/MATLAB to compare their reliability and stability. With the currently available technologies, based on the energy density of 250 Wh/kg for lithium-ion batteries and a power density of 8.8 kW/kg for generators, the use of the generators as backup sources proved more efficient than the use of HESS. The break-even point was observed at 750 Wh/kg for battery energy density. Any value more than the 750 Wh/kg energy density makes HESS lighter and more efficient than generators.

Keywords: electric aircraft (EA); hybrid energy storage system (HESS); superconducting magnetic energy storage (SMES); turboelectric distributed propulsion system (TeDP) (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/3/1806/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/3/1806/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:15:y:2023:i:3:p:1806-:d:1039061

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().