Research to help hydrogen-electric aircraft take off

[Music] Well Stralis has got this really exciting project right they want to transition the aviation industry from doing jet fuel into a new energy form so it's decarbonised sustainable so they're looking to do a flight from Brisbane to Gladstone as their first flight a hydrogen fuel cell aircraft we're really happy to be working with Stralis to be doing this project with them and helping them out been contact with with Bob Criner and his team over a number of years we've seen how they've developed and we've been talking with them for for a while on their ambitions and how can CQU support them and so this project came up which was a they needed some additional specialty to add value to what they're doing and the CSIRO had the RUIC program the Regional University universities and Industry Collaboration program that had the funding here at Stralis we have big plans we're planning to fly the first hydrogen powered aircraft in the southern hemisphere we've already achieved first propeller spin and we're now bringing hydrogen into the mix our team has been pushing hard towards this milestone and it wouldn't have been possible without our hydrogen flight alliance members so hydrogen becomes the fuel so it's replacing the jet fuel so jet fuel is kerosene so we need to replace that so we don't have the CO2 emissions so hydrogen is a cleaner fuel so the hydrogen in the as a liquid hydrogen form in the tanks on the aircraft will be supplied to a fuel cell the fuel cell converts hydrogen to power that's driving the propellers this fuel cell is very sensitive to temperature so we need the temperature not to be too hot or too cold if it's too hot it degrades quickly so we need to then replace the fuel cell too frequently so we need the fuel cell to last as long as possible so we need to keep its maximum its high temperature under a certain um temperature value and we don't want it too cold if it's too cold it doesn't produce as much power and then the aircraft isn't going to fly very well so there's this sweet spot in its temperature just like we as humans like a sweet spot in our temperature so do fuel sells so that's what the the cooling system and cooling management system that Dr Michael Opolot is designing for Stralis is all about it's to control the temperature and its sweet spot so Dr Michael Opolot is one of our fantastic early career researchers he's got great knowledge and and background in what we call thermal temperature exchange processes so that's chemical engineering so he's got the perfect skills for this for this project to add that extra value into what Stralis is doing as the aviation industry transitions to a new type of of fuel getting away from jet fuel the very short flights will go battery is the most likely type of Aviation the very long flights over to America and Europe is likely to go sustainable aviation fuel so that'll be a biofuel or a waste to a biofuel type liquid fuel but there's this mid-range which is perfect for hydrogen so it's too far for batteries and it's a lot more sustainable and and better for the environment being hydrogen because it's so much cleaner so this is this year is is a really important year to turn all those early designs and feasibility studies that have been done over the last few years to been really concrete deliverable outcome so the investment being turned into actual infrastructure and and outcome so if Australis that means the first flight from Brisbane to Gladstone [Music]