Conceptual design of a commercial airliner powered by hybrid-hydrogen architecture

Conceptual design of a commercial airliner powered by hybrid-hydrogen architecture. The demand for air traffic has been increasing since more people chose air travel to road travel, and as from the pandemic, the impact of human’s emissions has become an increasingly obvious and urgent issue. The use of fossil fuel combustion in aircraft at the state of the art, contributes to the escalation of global emissions, the urgent awareness of climate impact is stimulating the search for pioneering solutions for subsonic aviation attempting in decarbonize our skies. Hydrogen’s new technology allow to cut the CO2 emissions off, different solutions could be adopted to innovate the air traffic scenario. Primary target of this master’s degree thesis project is the development of an algoritm for a conceptual design process for a full hydrogen-powered aircraft with hybrid technolgy: fuel cell and direct combustion of gaseous hydrogen. The methodologies employed aim to implement the conceptual design process of a medium-range aircraft whose high-levels characteristics are comparable to the A320 belonging to the Airbus family. The methodology developed references to Raymer’s approach. As first step guessing the hybridization degree, then calculating the maximum takeoff mass (MTOW) and sizing the fuel cell in relation to the degree of hybridization. The construction of the matching chart is crucial to evaluate the required thrust to sustain and consequenly to power the aircraft. Subsequently a preliminary sketch of the aircraft is provided, sizing the hydrogen tanks and the balance of plant, then allocating the fuel cell stack. Liquid hydrogen is classified as the best hydrogen storage method, this has an impact on the overall structure resulting in heavier tanks compared to traditional kerosene. A trade-off study is then conducted to establish the best degree of hybridization for main propulsion and the power distribuition for the secondary systems