The Anonymous Widower

Could Current Airliners Be Fuelled With Ammonia?

The title of this post, surely falls into the category of tabloid stories, that you get on a slow news day, when the Science Editor has been drinking in a pub, with a fantasist, who claims he runs his Ford Cortina on carrots.

But read this article on the Ammonia Association web site, which is entitled Zero Emission Aircraft: Ammonia For Aviation.

This is a paragraph from the article.

The propulsion system was devised by Reaction Engines and investigated by a team at STFC’s Rutherford Appleton Laboratory … It would have the potential to efficiently crack the ammonia fuel using heat harvested from the jet engine through Reaction Engines’ ground-breaking heat exchangers to provide a zero-carbon fuel blend of ammonia and hydrogen that burns stably just like jet fuel. The density of liquid ammonia allows for conventional aircraft configurations to be used and it may be possible to retrofit into an existing engine, resulting in a zero-carbon jet that could start serving the short haul market well before the 2050 target currently set by the industry.

Note.

1. The Rutherford Appleton Laboratory is based at Harwell.
2. Reaction Engines Wikipedia entry is interesting.

Read the Ammonia Association article in full.

Conclusion

I believe that the answer to the question in the title of this post is Yes!

April 23, 2021 - Posted by AnonW | Energy, Transport/Travel | Ammonia, Aviation, Science