Airbus to use outdated superjumbo jet to test hydrogen-fuelled flights

Tue, 22 Feb, 2022 - 18:30

Charlotte Ryan

Airbus will use its A380 jet as the unlikely test bed to help the industry fly into a fuel-efficient future. The jet is the last superjumbo of a bygone kerosene-guzzling era.

Airbus will use it to test its first propulsion system using hydrogen, a fuel the planemaker wants to introduce on a new passenger aircraft by 2035. The modified double-decker, the first of its kind that Airbus ever built, will maintain its four conventional turbines, while a fifth engine adapted for hydrogen use will be mounted on the rear fuselage.

The unusual design of the demonstration aircraft, developed in collaboration with engine-maker CFM International, will allow engine emissions including contrails to be monitored separately from those of the engine powering the aircraft, Airbus said. Contrails, or the wispy clouds planes leave behind in the sky, are of growing concern in lowering emissions as they trap warmer air in the atmosphere.

The hydrogen test programme will give at least one of the troubled jumbo jets, consigned to the commercial scrap heap even before the pandemic, a second life as it tests the new technology.

While hydrogen is still under research for use in jet engines, Airbus is attempting to rally the aviation industry behind the technology as it faces mounting pressure to reduce emissions that lead to global warming. Last year, the airline industry’s main trade group endorsed a plan to reach net-zero carbon emissions by the middle of the century.

“To achieve these goals by 2050 the industry has to take action now and we are,” said Gael Meheust, CFM’s chief executive.

The demonstrator is set to begin flying in the middle of this decade. While a commercial product will be much smaller, the development plan allows Airbus to take advantage of the A380’s size to give engineers room for extra tanks, testing equipment, and the fifth engine at the back.