Technoeconomic and Energy Life Cycle Assessments of Wind Energy Systems for Regional Hybrid Electric Aircraft

This paper compares energy cost and life cycle CO2 equivalent (CO2e) emissions of regional hybrid electric aircraft against conventional regional aircraft supported by jet fuel. Various regional hybrid-electric aircraft were considered, having a range of battery specific energies and degrees of hybridization. The energy cost and life cycle emissions for these aircraft were evaluated across three electricity supply scenarios: 1) electricity is sourced from an existing grid, 2) electricity is sourced from a correspondingly sized wind turbine and battery energy storage system (BESS), or 3) electricity is sourced from a combination of an existing grid and a sized wind energy system. To evaluate infrastructure impacts, an airport site is identified with high wind potential resulting in favorable wind turbine infrastructure size, cost, and CO2e emissions. The results of the study show the impact of hybrid electric aircraft battery specific energy and degree of hybridization on energy costs. As the battery specific energy increases in value, energy consumption and energy cost reduces. The breakeven energy cost for hybrid electric aircraft with electricity provided by a wind turbine and BESS is calculated relative to conventional aircraft. The breakeven cost reduces when the associated renewable energy infrastructure is sized to support lower charge rates or more flights per day. When evaluating hybrid electric aircraft energy CO2e emissions, the total CO2e emissions are heavily influenced by grid emission characteristics. When evaluating the case where hybrid electric aircraft are supported by sized wind energy infrastructure alone, emission reductions are seen compared to the conventional aircraft for all hybrid electric aircraft and electricity demand characteristics considered.