ABU: Autonomous Battery Units for eVTOLs

What is it about?

Urban air mobility (UAM), which transports a few passengers or a small amount of cargo within a metropolitan area on demand, expects future aircraft — e.g., electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft — to use batteries for energy during flight. However, battery energy density remains many times smaller than the threshold required for practical and economical flight. To hasten electrification of flight, we propose autonomous battery units (ABUs) as an enabling technology for UAM with eVTOLs. Assisted-takeoff ABUs reduce mission energy by seven to 24%; assisted-cruise ABUs reduce end-of-mission depth-of-discharge (DOD) to as little as 16%; assisted-landing ABUs support divert missions with as little as 30 kWh mission energy capacity; and ABUs increase UAM flights per eight-hour period by 1.5x to 2.6x, showing that ABUs significantly improve eVTOL operations for UAM.

Featured Image

Photo by Hyundai Motor Group on Unsplash

Photo by Hyundai Motor Group on Unsplash

Why is it important?

This work proposes autonomous battery units (ABUs) as an enabling technology for urban air mobility (UAM) with electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft. Battery energy density remains many times smaller than the threshold required for practical and economical flight; ABUs hasten electrification of flight.