Industry Hot Spots | Let New Energy Vehicles 'fly'
May 16, 2024
Editor's note:
On April 7, the Civil Aviation Administration of China issued a production license for EHang's intelligent EH216-S unmanned manned aircraft system. This model became the world's first eVTOL (electric vertical take-off and landing) aircraft with all three certificates.
Generally speaking, an aircraft requires three types of certificates from production to commercial operation, namely type certificate, airworthiness certificate and production license. As the EH216-S has successively obtained three major certificates, it means that this model has become the world's first "flying car" that can fly into the sky.
As a very important part of the low-altitude economy, the official launch of "flying cars" has also made the concept of low-altitude economy explode in recent times, and a trillion-level market is ready to take off.
This article is excerpted from the book "Changing Lanes: New Energy Vehicles on China's Roads" by Miao Wei
On November 8, 2021, an article was published on the website of the British "Economist" weekly - "What's next?" "22 Emerging Technologies Worth Watching in 2022", one of which is flying electric taxis.
Economist weekly article
Flying electric taxis, known in the industry as vertical take-off and landing electric aircraft, have long been considered a fantasy, but are now increasingly becoming a reality. Many companies around the world have stepped up test flights in 2022, hoping to obtain commercial certification in the next year or two.
American Joby Aviation plans to build more than 10 five-seat aircraft with a range of 150 miles (approximately 242 kilometers). German company Volocopt hopes to provide air taxi services for the 2024 Paris Olympics.
Volocopter tests electric air taxi at Le Bourget air show
Flying electric taxis are only one technical route of "flying cars", represented by Geely in our country; the other route points directly to the true sense of "flight" + "car", which is a "flying car" designed with integrated land and air design that can run and fly. "Flying cars are not limited to vertical take-off and landing aircraft. Xiaopeng is the representative of this route.
With the popularity of automobiles, urban road congestion has become a "stumbling block" to automobile driving. In order to solve the congestion problem, some new energy vehicle companies have turned their attention to the air. In the context of global automotive electrification and intelligent development, automotive and aviation technologies are gradually penetrating and integrating. As a new means of transportation for urban air transportation and future travel, flying cars are increasingly valued by global innovators.
As early as 2017, the domestic automobile company Geely acquired the American flying car company Terrafugia, which was founded in 2006 and has launched two generations of flying cars. After the acquisition, the Chinese name of the company was Taili Speed Car, and Geely established Hubei Geely Taili Speed Car Co., Ltd. in Wuhan. In September 2020, Sichuan Aoshi Technology Co., Ltd. and Hubei Geely Taili Flying Vehicle Co., Ltd. jointly established Wofei Changkong Technology (Chengdu) Co., Ltd. The former is a young industrial drone R&D and manufacturing company established in 2016. In 2021, Volocopter established a joint venture with Germany's Volocopter, which is controlled by Volocopter. In January of the same year, Wofei Changkong announced that its Taili Flying Vehicle TF-1 had obtained the airworthiness certificate from the US Federal Aviation Administration. It was the first product of this type to obtain an airworthiness certificate.
TaiLi Speed TF-1 obtained the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration airworthiness certificate
This product will be produced in my country and is the world's first hybrid two-seater sports aircraft that can take off and land vertically. When driving on land, the wings can be folded, and the entire vehicle width is about the same as that of a traditional car.
Taili speed car TF-1
The TF-1 fuselage is mainly made of composite materials, with a designed take-off mass of about 850 kilograms, a cruising speed of 167 kilometers per hour, a cruising altitude of 3,000 meters, and a range of 670 kilometers. The fuel consumption is only equivalent to that of a 2.0-liter car.
In November 2021, He Xiaopeng, chairman of Xpeng Motors, said in a speech at a forum that a small number of cars after 2024 will fly into the air, and in 2030 they will occupy a larger area of the sky. Xpeng Motors established Xpeng Huitian Company specifically for this purpose and completed a Series A financing of more than US$500 million, with a valuation reaching US$1 billion. Xpeng Motors hopes to open Robotaxi operations as early as 2023. He Xiaopeng once said that Xpeng Huitian is still working hard on flying cars. After launching the Traveler X2, it is developing a flying car for both air and land use. The price of this car will be less than 1 million yuan.
Xiaopeng flying car takes flight in Guangzhou CBD
At the 2021 European Aircraft Show, Xpeng Huitian demonstrated its sixth-generation flying car concept model. This flying car will directly integrate aircraft and cars and is expected to officially meet the public in 2024. The entire fuselage adopts a carbon fiber structure. The mass of the empty aircraft including the battery is 560 kilograms. It can carry two passengers and the maximum load is 200 kilograms. It also adopts a pure electric design, has a flight time of 35 minutes, a flight altitude of less than 1 kilometer, and a maximum flight speed of 130 kilometers per hour. In addition, it is equipped with two modes: manual operation and automatic operation. In the automatic operation mode, users can realize unmanned driving according to the set programs and routes.
Xiaopeng Huitian flying car concept car (photo provided by Xiaopeng Huitian)
At the 13th China International Aerospace Expo, EHang Intelligent demonstrated its first two-seater manned aircraft, the VT-30. This is a high-tech private enterprise dedicated to the research and development of intelligent autonomous aircraft. It was founded in 2014 and listed on NASDAQ in the United States in 2019. The VT-30 fuselage adopts a composite wing structure, which can meet the mixed balance of lift and thrust. The aircraft also has the advantages of safe and intelligent automatic flight, cluster management, low noise, etc. It can carry two passengers, has a designed range of 300 kilometers, and a designed endurance time of 100 minute. At the end of November 2021, EHang 216 completed its test flight in Bali, Indonesia. This is also a two-seater aircraft with an 8-axis 16-blade multi-rotor that can provide air taxi services.
EHang Intelligent's first two-seater manned aircraft VT-30
Many foreign automobile companies such as Toyota, Daimler, and Hyundai Motor, as well as aviation companies such as Boeing and Airbus, are also actively studying the feasibility of flying cars. A large number of venture investors are optimistic about this "window" and have invested in these vehicles. project. According to incomplete statistics, as of 2021, more than 200 companies or institutions around the world are developing flying car products, with a total of more than 420 models.
Although many people are optimistic about the future development of flying cars, flying cars are limited by batteries, have short flight time, and have low cruising range, which are still technical bottlenecks. Moreover, flying cars are different from new energy vehicles that drive on land. The latter can increase the driving range by installing more batteries, but flying cars absolutely cannot increase the driving range by adding weight. Because flying cars have very high self-weight requirements, it is difficult to achieve vertical take-off if the weight is increased. The energy density and power density of existing power batteries cannot meet the requirements of flying cars. In the long term, liquid hydrogen plus fuel cells is one direction. Recently, some companies have to adopt hybrid solutions, whose purpose is also to reduce take-off mass.
The biggest bottleneck in the development of flying cars is air management. Flying cars must fly according to routes. The air is divided into low altitude and high altitude. Flying cars must comply with relevant laws and regulations. Many problems such as how to establish an efficient management system in the air, which department should manage it, how to effectively connect air and ground traffic management, etc., have not yet been touched by the whole world, and our country is no exception.
However, we should not limit our imagination. Human beings' yearning and pursuit of freedom have no limits. From roads to highways, from highways to expressways, from two lanes to eight lanes, from plane transportation to three-dimensional transportation, human beings have opened roads over mountains and built bridges over water. Now, from land transportation to land and air transportation, isn't it logical? The integration of low-altitude, low-speed general aviation and automobile power has achieved breakthroughs in the direction of electrification and intelligence. Eventually, aircraft and automobiles have become one. At least it is mature in terms of technology.
New energy flying cars not only add "wings" to new energy vehicles to soar into the sky, but also represent the integration of the automobile and aviation industries. It can be said to be a symbol of the infinite development space of new energy vehicles. One of the most romantic of imaginative possibilities.
The development of new energy vehicles in my country is in the ascendant. We firmly believe that based on the vested advantages of the "first half" and facing various challenges in the "second half", as long as we persevere, give full play to the creative role of the enterprise, and implement scientific policies, we will definitely be able to grasp the situation. Seize new opportunities and create a more brilliant future.
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