The Cold Heart That Powers Airbus ZEROe Aircraft

Hydrogen is key to the Airbus mission to bring zero-emissions aircraft to market by 2035, but it needs to be stored at an exceptionally chilly -253°C. Using this technology means developing innovative cryogenic hydrogen storage tanks. Luckily, Airbus have teams around its network with just the right set of skills to build them.

Airbus is constantly looking to harness innovative technologies to help it achieve its goal of bringing zero-emissions aircraft to market by 2035. A fairly fundamental aspect of this is how they will power such an aircraft. As such, they are putting a lot of effort into harnessing what they believe to be a very compelling option: hydrogen.

In its simplest terms, there are two main technologies that enable an aircraft to fly directly with hydrogen. You can power an engine with hydrogen combustion through modified gas turbine engines, and you can use hydrogen fuel cells to create electrical power. And you can deploy a hybrid approach that uses a mixture of both technologies.

But regardless of these options, there is a constant at work: hydrogen has to be kept very cold. It needs to be stored at -253°C, and kept at that temperature consistently throughout the whole flight, even when the tanks are depleted.

Storage tanks for a hydrogen-powered aircraft are therefore an absolutely essential component, but they are completely different to those you might find on a traditional aircraft. We immediately recognised that getting these tanks right would be vital to the success of the Airbus ZEROe aircraft, so about 15 months ago it established Zero Emission Development Centres (ZEDCs) in Nantes, France, and Bremen, Germany, with the task of designing and manufacturing the hydrogen tanks, and set to work.

“It’s a real testament to the teamwork across our sites to see this first tank being manufactured so quickly. We want to optimise the tank for greater efficiency and to further reduce its environmental footprint: after all, a zero-emission aircraft needs to be as close to zero emission as possible throughout its whole life cycle” states Chris Redfern, Head of Manufacturing, ZEROe Aircraft and Head of Propulsion Industrial Architect.