Air travel is a dirty business. To clean things up, engine manufacturer Rolls-Royce has partnered with European airline EasyJet to test a jet engine designed to run entirely on hydrogen fuel, which is renewable in the this week. The trial is a hopeful success, but there are still many hurdles to overcome before green air travel becomes a reality.
Rolls-Royce (not to be confused with the automobile manufacturer Rolls-Royce) and EasyJet announced their successful test in a third press release. This engine, a Rolls-Royce Pearl 15 commonly seen on regional AE 2100-A aircraft, is of course an early concept. But it proves that air travel can use truly green renewable fuels. It runs on hydrogen fuel, which is generated using only tidal and wind power. This is an extremely expensive way to produce hydrogen, but Rolls-Royce considers the fuel only as green as its production.
However, there are still many problems with hydrogen for ground and air travel, including fuel inefficiencies (fossil fuels are more beneficial for your money.) Theo Nature magazine Climate change, producing and burning hydrogen-based fuels requires five times more electricity than is needed by battery-powered cars. If that hydrogen is produced using fossil fuels, we’ve just added to the problem of climate change. However, automakers are seriously considering hydrogen fuel cells as a stay away from fossil fuels. Toyota has had some success with technology through Mirai—one of the only commercial hydrogen cars on the market today.
Both Rolls-Royce and EasyJet are committed to achievingzero carbon emissions by 2050. It’s good that they start now, as development will take decades. Hydrogen has always been promising as a fuel for transportation, especially in larger trucksbut it is extremely expensive to produce, store, and redistribute. While Rolls-Royce is also testing a battery-powered planeElectric or electrified airplanes don’t seem like the right choice because a heavy battery pack is definitely not what you want when trying to take off.
