ZEROAVIA HIGH TEMPERATURE FUEL CELL TESTING

On 9 March 2023 ZeroAvia announced that it has achieved record-breaking performance in testing of its High Temperature Proton Exchange Membrane (HTPEM) systems. Early testing of the pressurised 20kW HTPEM stack power module in ZeroAvia’s UK R&D location has demonstrated a record 2.5 kW/kg specific power at the cell level, paving the way for 3+ kW/kg system level densities in the next 24 months.

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Developing fuel cell technology for aviation is critical to enable true zero-emission commercial flight, and for energy intensive applications, like large, fixed wing aircraft and rotorcraft it is necessary to increase the temperature and pressure within fuel cell stacks in order to have a commercially viable product. Increased temperature and pressure allows for air cooling, reduces cooling drag, simplifies the system and ultimately enables much more demanding applications.

ZeroAvia’s team has made unprecedented deep tech breakthroughs by delivering a pressurised HTPEM system, innovative conductive coatings enabling the use of aluminium bipolar plates in highly aggressive HTPEM environments and a novel approach to advanced membrane electrode assembly (MEA).

ZeroAvia’s proprietary technology has been developed over the last three years as part of a concentrated effort to build an in-house portfolio of critical technologies for fuel cell aviation at ZeroAvia.