Toward more electric powertrains in aircraft: Technical challenges and advancements

Abstract

The main purpose of this article is to provide an instructive review of the technological challenges hindering the road toward more electric powertrains in aircraft. Hybrid, all-electric, and turboelectric powertrain architectures are discussed as possible fuel consumption and weight reduction solutions. Among these architectures, the short-term implementation of hybrid and all-electric architectures is limited, particularly for large-capacity aircraft due to the low energy/power density levels achievable by state-of-the-art electrical energy storage systems. Conversely, turboelectric architectures with advanced distributed propulsion and boundary layer ingestion are set to lead the efforts toward more electric powertrains. At the center of this transition, power converters and high-power density electric machines, i.e., electric motors and generators, and their corresponding thermal management systems are analyzed as the key devices enabling the more electric powertrain. Moreover, to further increase the fuel efficiency and power density of the aircraft, the benefits and challenges of implementing higher voltage powertrains are described. Lastly, based on the findings collected in this article, the projected roadmap toward more electric aircraft powertrains is presented. Herein, the individual targets for each technology, i.e., batteries, electric machines, and power converters, and how they translate to future aircraft prototypes are illustrated.

Deep Reinforcement Learning for DC-DC Converter Parameters Optimization

“…L is the inductance value and N is the number of winding turns on the core. In the meantime, the maximum flux density B max and the sectional area A e can be expressed as (2).…”

“…Initialize two networks with same structures and parameters. • (2). Initialize the state s and iteratively update state by interacting with environment following the rules of choosing actions and giving rewards.…”

“…Research on implementing Artificial Intelligence (AI) into power electronics in order to optimize the power electronics design has become a hot research topic. More and more strict requirements for power converter design are proposed due to their wide applications in novel decarbonized applications, such as electric vehicles [1], electrical aircraft [2], and solar photovoltaic systems [3], etc. Thus, optimal design of power converters with high efficiency and high power density is expected in practical applications.…”

Health management using fault detection and fault tolerant control of multicellular converter applied in more electric aircraft system

“…Recently, the aircraft system plays an important role in globe world economics, human culture, space discovering, and technology development [1][2]. However, in order to obtain aircraft with fewer carbon emission, fuel saving, quitter flight and reduced weight and noise, the traditionally actuators powered by mechanical, pneumatic, and hydraulic sources such as environmental control, wing ice protection, and fuel pumping systems) are replaced by controlled electric systems [3][4][5]. To this manner, a considerable change in the design of modern aircraft.…”

Double adaptive power allocation strategy in electric vehicles with battery/supercapacitor hybrid energy storage system

“…In these vehicles, the propulsion is provided by EMs fed from a DC energy source. It is possible to see these vehicles in land transportation, 4,7,8 air transportation, 9,10 and marine transportation. 11,12 High efficiency, low energy consumption, less noise operation, and zero or low carbon emissions are among the main advantages of these vehicles.…”