An innovation proposed by the French start-up Sylphaero could make the aviation sector much greener than it is today.
Aviation is still too polluting today
Today we know that air travel is harmful to the planet. This indeed is very polluting, representing 2.6% of global CO2 emissions alone. A constant that is all the more worrying as experts estimate that the increase in air traffic will be increasingly significant in the coming years.
Therefore, operators in the sector they try every year to find technological innovations to reduce CO2 emissions in our atmosphere during air travel. A trend that is already showing good results as CO2 emissions per passenger have decreased by 50% over the last 30 years and the latest generations of planes and engines emit less CO2 per passenger and per kilometer than a car occupied by one or two people.
Today Many avenues are being explored to replace the use of fossil fuels in aviation, such as biofuels. However, even if the pollution levels of the latter are much lower, they still pollute considerably and are above all more expensive, so much so that to date we are unable to produce them in sufficiently large quantities.
Consequentially, the start-up Sylphaero, based in Mérignac near Bordeaux, in France, looked for a way to decarbonize aviation much more drastically, by manufacturing 100% electric jet engines. An innovation that could allow us to eliminate the environmental problem of air transport in the future.
A new type of electrothermal engine
France has always been a leading nation in the aviation sector, bringing numerous innovations in this field throughout history, innovations that have made it possible, for example, to improve flight safety, travel efficiency or even reduce greenhouse gas emissions into our atmosphere.
Today, Sylphaero offers a potentially revolutionary innovation for the future of aviation. The scientists working in this Start-up created in 2021 are in fact developing a new type of electrothermal engine for aircraft. These are actually reactors in which researchers do not burn fuel, but use instead electric arcs to heat the air.
These very high-power electric arcs will heat the air up to several thousand degrees Celsius and transform it into a plasma, allowing thrust to be generated in the same way as a conventional reactor but without emitting CO2.
Thanks to this solution, the Start-up can address the problem of energy transition in the aviation sector, offering flight speeds similar to current conventional solutions, high performance and ease of maintenance. The technology developed by the start-up is therefore applied to all types of engines and aircraft.
Sylphaero was also supported by Dassault Systèmes’ 3DExperienceLab, a facility whose ambition is to accelerate innovation across all industrial sectors. The technology proposed by Sylphaero therefore fits perfectly with this idea, allowing the performance of aircraft to be increased by decarbonizing them. Furthermore, in addition to future civil applications, this important innovation could also be used in the space sector but also in other types of propulsion applications.
