Hybrid Engines
Today governments and aerospace industries keep into high considerations aeronautical transportation environmental impacts (pollution, noise and climate change). Also users (both civil and military users) keep into high consideration aircraft performances such as fuel consumption, mission flexibility, safety and reliability.
One of the aspects on which governments and industries are focusing efforts in order to reduce environmental impacts and improve mission performances is the on board energy management: the energy management encompasses all aspects of on-board energy provision, storage, distribution and consumption.
Working on this topic Hybrid Energy Management project aims to arrange, evaluate, analyze and develop hybrid propulsive architectures for UAV and General Aviation able to optimize performances about the management of aircraft energy. This kind of architectures, leveraging innovative solutions and enabling technologies relevant to electromagnetic and electrical aspects, allow to optimize the control of energy fluxes in order to reach high performances (e.g. reduce fuel consumption, power boost,…) with economic returns.
The project, aimed to investigate architectures able to optimize the on board energy management and to reduce environmental impacts, deals with system aspects (KPI definition, architecture definition) and with enabling technologies required to realize the selected architectures.
Starting from the performance requirements (e.g specific fuel consumption, mission reliability, safety and flexibility) and from the potential architectures definition, the enabling technologies will be developed realizing sub-system technological demonstrators (e.g. high frequency low losses electrical machines, high efficiency energy storage systems…): these sub-system will be integrated in the system technological demonstrator in order to evaluate the effectiveness of the technologies and the architecture selected.
In order to reach this goal, the project involves different partners with extensive experience and know how about aerospace systems, electrical machines, power conversion, systems control, energy storage and reciprocating engines. All these partners are able to develop and manage enabling technologies required to realize innovative architectures aimed to optimize the on board energy management.
The "Greening the Propulsion", presented as part of the Cluster "Aerospace", aims to strengthen the industrial, scientific and district levels through the involvement of a national system of distinctive competences already involved by Avio in collaboration projects and in other research projects for the development of new technologies for aeronautical and space applications, with the aim to maintain international competitiveness in the champions of the sector.
By achieving the technical objectives, it will be possible to strengthen the collaboration network already underway on the national level and "run-in" with the Districts, to contribute to the achievement of a leadership role in Europe, thanks to the favorable forecasts of the market in coming decades and, thanks to the Avio participation to major international aerospace projects, to contribute to generate employment at national level.
The civil aviation industry is, in fact, a sector with promising market scenarios for growth in the medium to long term, despite the global crisis, but with the need to innovate in order to meet the technological challenges needed to guard the Western supremacy in this field.
Competitiveness and environmental sustainability are the key drivers which focus on innovation. The requirements that follow for the aeronautical propulsion are: the reduction of the cost of the product and production processes among the entire life cycle and the design and development of new engine architectures with low environmental impact, characterized by a significant reduction in CO2, NOx and noise emissions.
The propulsion is one of the systems that more requires "step change" technology to satisfy, for example, the ACARE objectives of fuel consumption and emissions reduction. Objectives, among other things, made even more challenging by the ACARE Vision 2050 (Flighpath 2050 - to take ACARE Goals beyond 2020).
In addition, the leadership in innovation in the field of jet engine has become a discriminating factor in order to have access to the market and to be a partner of leading OEMs such as GE, RR or PW.
Apart from the existing market with its evolution, the reference to the project relates to the technology strategic Avio vision to face the aerospace market of regional, narrow-body and wide-body with entry-into-service around 2016-2025.
The selection innovation technologies involved in this the project have been driven by the need to further strengthen the interregional network of Universities and SMEs to access to future aircraft development programs (Horizon2020) and to capture international business opportunities with a significant role for future engines "wide-body" and "narrow-body" with traditional configurations, innovative (Geared Turbo Fan) and future (Open Rotor).
The project will focus, therefore, on the following platforms:
- Low Pressure Turbine Platform, which aims to achieve more efficient and light Turbines to compete in the market of future engines that will be launched.
- Mechanical Transmission Platform, whose main challenge in this project is the extension of the national supply chain. Avio, as world leadership on transmissions, can effectively "pull" national companies that specialize in accessories (oil pumps, fuel pumps, oil sensors etc..). This, moreover, represents a valuable opportunity to further optimize the transmission itself. This capability to design and produce accessories is also broadly applicable to the aeronautical market of fixed and rotary wing aircraft.
- New manufacturing processes and materials, it is intended to carry out research aiming to impact on new materials for turbine blades and processes (Additive Manufacturing) considered "radical" by the potential impact on reducing the cost, time and minimizing environmental aspects in the manufacture of aircraft components and general industrial.
- Hybrid Propulsion for Space Applications that allows to unify the advantages of the liquid fuel propulsion and of the solid propellant, especially in terms of cost, simplicity, performance and security.
- Hybrid Engine for Aeronautical applications that focuses on the most innovative aircraft configurations "more electric" in order to seize opportunities for new products following the development trends of electricity needs.
