Authors
Ahluwalia, R.; Peng, J-K; Wang, X.; Papadias, D.; Kopasz, J.
Abstract
Several companies are developing enabling elements of urban air mobility (UAM) for air taxis,including prototypes of electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) vehicles. These prototypesincorporate electric and hybrid powertrains for multi-rotor and tilt-rotor crafts. Many eVTOLS areusing batteries for propulsion and charging them rapidly between the flights or swapping them forslow charging overnight. Rapid charging degrades the battery cycle life while swapping requiresmultiple batteries and charging stations. This study has conducted a technoeconomic evaluation ofthe eVTOL air taxis with alternate powertrains using hydrogen fuel cell systems being developedfor light-duty and heavy-duty vehicles. We consider performance metrics such as fuel cell enginepower, weight, and durability; hydrogen consumption and weight of storage system; and maximumtake-off weight. The metrics for economic evaluation are capital cost, operating and maintenancecost, fuel cost, and the total cost of ownership (TCO). We compare the performance and TCO ofbattery, fuel cell and fuel cell battery hybrid powertrains for multi-rotor and tilt-rotor crafts. Weshow that fuel cells are the only viable concept for powering multi-rotor eVTOLs on an urbanscenario that requires 60-mile range, and hybrid fuel cells are superior to batteries as powertrains for tiltrotor eVTOLs