Sizing Analysis of a Battery System for an Electrically-Propelled Airplane

• Autor(a) principal: Teixeira, Micael Valverde
• Data de Publicação: 2018
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10400.6/8436
• topic: Aviões Com Propulsão Elétrica; Ingestão de Camada Limite; Propulsão Distribuída; Propulsão Elétrica; Propulsão Elétrica Híbrida; Tecnologia de Baterias; Domínio/Área Científica::Engenharia e Tecnologia::Engenharia Aeronáutica

The electric propulsion concept has proven over the past decades that it can be a good solution to substitute internal combustion engines in airplanes in order to create a more efficient, environmentally friendly and reliable way of travelling through air. Still it has not been able to reach its potential due to many limitations with today’s active technologies, mainly the batteries. Several companies have already started to outfit some airplane models with electric motors and a battery power source and use them as test beds for future research and development of electric propulsion concepts. Since most of this companies tend to make information regarding this subject confidential due to its relevancy in today’s age, an algorithm was developed, that is capable of using current conceptual airplane design methods and use historical data to predict and evaluate the sizing of a battery powered system for an electrically-propelled airplane configuration. As is was expected, the algorithm showed that with current battery technology, electrically-propelled airplanes are still far from being able to compete with their internal combustion engine counterparts. Still the next decades should prove to be instrumental for the electrical propulsion concept to assert itself in the aviation market.