Clean Propulsion Q1 round up

With commitments to electrification and future fuels going nowhere fast, we thought we'd take a look back over the first quarter of the year to see what's been going on in the clean propulsion space.

Investments

Q1 saw GKN Aerospace invest $50 million in growing their world-leading sustainable additive fabrication capabilities. They're aiming to deliver more sustainable engine components, as well as reducing the use raw materials in production. A win-win for the environment!

Just last month Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry announced its intention to invest 4 trillion Yen ($26 billion) in developing the next-gen hydrogen powered passenger jet.

And in other government news, the UK government announced a £16.6 million boost for semiconductor researchers to help make chips that could be used in EVs in the future.

Partnerships

ZeroAvia and Flyv have partnered on clean, on-demand flight across Europe. This partnership is set to explore regional air networks across Europe, seeing what economic and passenger benefits fuel-cell powered flight could truly have at economy flight level. And with their CEO Val being named on the TIME100 Climate list late last year, we'll be watching what ZeroAvia do next with interest.

New technologies

Water powered planes? Universal Hydrogen's megawatt scale liquid H2 airliner powertrain came to life in Q1. They have the world's largest hydrogen airline, and are currently testing swappable liquid hydrogen fuel modules that'll radically boost the range of clean passenger aircraft operations by 2026. We're looking forward to seeing how this one develops!

According to Bloomberg we've also hit the tipping point when it comes to EVs. When countries hit 5% of new car sales being purely electric, this typically signals the beginning of mass adoption. 31 countries in the world are now at this point (up from 19 in 2022) so it'll be interesting to see how many continue to make progress towards their electrification targets from here.